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JOHN HENRY NEWMAN 



tE^^e MibersiDe literature Series; 



SELECTIONS FEOM THE PROSE 
AKD POETRY OF 

JOHN HENEY NEWMAN 



EDITED BY 
MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, LL.D., J.V.D. 

Professor of English Language and Literature in 
The Catholic University of America 




HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

Boston : 4 Park. Street ; New York : 85 Fifth Avenue 
Chicago : 378-388 Wabash Avenue 



i!..onf\KYofCONGRESSy 
j two Coulee Received 

I SEP 16 I90f 

i , CoDvnrht Bntiy 

l0Ut/;i4 XXc, No, 
COPY U 






COPYRIGHT 1907 BY HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



TO 

THE REVEREND WILLIAM GEORGE READ MULLAN, S.J. 
WHO SUGGESTED THIS VOLUME 



CONTENTS 

Introduction . • . vii 

Chronological Outlinb of Newman's Life xix 

Bibliography . . . xx 

Selections 

I. Biographical, from Apologia Pro Vita Sua : 

The Young Mind of Newman 1 

At Home and Abroad 15 

The Last Pages of the Apologia 21 

, n. Expository and Argumentative : 

'Rev ealed Religion, iroia The Grammar of Assent ... 38 
The Ground of the Protestant View, from Lectures on 

the Present Position of Catholics 50 

Who 's to Blame ? from Discussions and Arguments 

Characteristics of the Athenians 62 

Parallel Characteristics of Englishmen .... 68 

Reverse of the Picture 75 

Divided Allegiance, from A Letter to His Grace the Bulce 
of Norfolk on Occasion of Mr. Gladstone'' s Expostulation 81 

III. Philosophical and Reflective, from The Idea of a 

University : 

Literature 103 

English Catholic Literature in its Relation to Classical 

Literature 121 

Knowledge and Religious Duty 134 

IV. Emotional and Oratorical : 

Mental Sufferings of our Lord in His Passion, from Dis- 
courses Addressed to Mixed Congregations 148 

Purity and Love, from Discourses Addressed to Mixed 
Congregations 165 

The Religion of the Pharisee, the Religion of Mankind, 
from Sermons Preached on Various Occasions . . , 185 



VI CONTENTS 

Y, Narrative and Historical: 

Abelard, from Historical Sketches 200 

The Peoples of the Plains, from Historical Sketches . . 211 

Marcus Tullius Cicero, from Historical Sketches . . . 221 
St. Philip and Savonarola, from Sermons Preached on 

Various Occasions 231 

VI. Descriptive and Imaginative: 

The Possession of Juba, from Callista 244 

The Plague of Locusts, from Callista 258 

Loss and Gain^ Part I, Chapter XII 267 

Vn. Poems: 

My Lady Nature and Her Daughters 279 

Sensitiveness 282 

Humiliation 282 

The Queen of Seasons 283 

Valentine to a Little Girl 285 

The Good Samaritan 286 

Waiting for the Morning 287 

Hora Novissima 287 

Lucis Creator Optime 288 

The Pillar of the Cloud . 289 

Two Lyrics from The Bream of Gerontius 290 

Home 292 

Notes 293 



INTEODUCTION 

In the beginning of this little book of selections from the 
works of Cardinal Newman, it is best that I should avoid 
misunderstanding by saying that it is not intended for per- 
sons who have already studied them and expect new and 
even subtle illumination. It is intended for those younger 
students who ought to begin to consider English style in the 
light of an art as soon as they begin to write. It is intended, 
too, for those — and there are many — who admire Newman 
while they think that they are too busy to read his most 
important books. To the latter this volume may serve as a 
practical introduction to a new world ; but too much in that 
way must not be expected of it ; it cannot supply the place 
of the culture without which the reader must miss some of 
the strongest and finest qualities of Newman's substance and 
style ; and he who comes to it to complete an education not 
yet begun, will of course be disappointed. 

It aims primarily to show that Newman's style was the 
result of constant care on his part, and that, as far as he 
could control it, it was the result of study as conscious as 
that of Stevenson.! No one can tell us what quality of force 
sends the sap in May to the stems of a rosebush ; but Mr. 
Burbank of Los Angeles knows exactly what tints of color 
a rose may have, since he knows the process by which roses 
are made more splendid year after year. English prose style 
has grown by processes that can be analyzed since the end 
of the fourteenth century, when Chaucer's Parson's Tale 
dragged its slow length along. The writer of to-day must — 
to be even the equal of his fellows — have a fixed artistic 

^ See Memories and Portraits : " A College Magazine." 



X INTRODUCTION 

and the life and significance of every word, I am prompted 
indignantly to exclaim that no style is left for^ historians of 
an after day." 

During his absence from England, 1833, poetry became 
his natural language. His letters home are full of it. To his 
mother, to his sister Jemima, he often sends a sonnet or 
a song. " I send two songs a la mode de Walter Scott," he 
writes, — 

" When mirth is full and free, 
Some sudden gloom shall be ; — - 

and another, beginning, 

When Heaven sends sorrow 
Warnings go first.'* 

His constant exercises in poetic form helped to give that 
delicate cadence to his prose which is so remarkable, and 
which ought to be to the scrupulous student a subject of 
care. Euphony in prose style is too little regarded by many of 
us who try hard, with almost scientific precision, to be clear 
and forcible. In despair an earnest young writer has often 
said, " But Newman had a naturally fine ear for music." 
This is probably true, and yet how many persons with a good 
sense of musical values write harsh and repellant prose. If 
anybody thinks that Newman left any of his artistic effects 
to chance, let him read the early letters ^ of this great stylist 
and follow chronologically the development of his prose. 
Sir Walter Besant,^ a novelist of distinction in the last 
century, was one of the first writers to insist that a course 
in English verse is an excellent preparation for the writing 
of English prose. And in tracing the development of New- 
man's style, one becomes more and more convinced that this 
is true. The great poets, — Dryden, for instance, — when 
they dropped into prose, wrote good prose. 

The progress of Cardinal Newman's style is the progress of 

^ Letters and Correspondence. By Mrs. Mozley. ^ 

2 Author of All Sorts and Conditions of Men, etc. 



INTRODUCTION XI 

the man, and one finds the sincere man under all the changes 
in his style. Literature to him was never a science, but 
always an art, — an art used as a means for strengthening 
the relation of souls with their Creator. The alpha and 
omega was God, and it was by the Word, which he esteemed 
as the symbol of God, that he felt he could make this rela- 
tion stronger and deeper. The working of God in him was 
a perennial source of wonder and gratitude, and without 
vanity, with utter simplicity, he chiselled his word that it 
might reflect the greatness of the goodness of God dealing 
with a human creature. His accuracy in weighing his 
thoughts is no less exact than his accuracy in weighing the 
phrase in which he expresses not only his thought but the 
very color, the tint of the temper in which his thoughts were 
uttered. His letters show this even more than his works 
written for publication ; for he believed in the letter as the 
most valuable expression of the varying moods of person- 
ality. Literature is, above all, personal expression, and 
Newman's letters are not only the finest kind of literature, 
but without them the phases of development of his Angli- 
can period cannot be understood. So careful was he that 
there should be no cloud of misunderstanding, — since his 
life and its manifestations must be known to the world, — 
he preferred that their records, before the period at which 
he entered the Catholic Church, should be put in the hands 
of a Protestant. No Catholic could interpret conditions of 
mind and soul so alien to him, as no Protestant could be 
entirely in sympathy with the later development of his life 
in the Catholic Church. And yet Dr. Edwin A. Abbott,^ 
a devout Protestant, can do nothing better in the way of 
showing his insight into Newman's Anglican life than by 
comparing Newman with Hamlet; — 

" We compared Newman to Hamlet, the man of dreams, 
and doubts, and scruples, and delays, interspersed with fitful 

^ The Anglican Career .of Cardinal Newman. By Edwin A. 
Abbott, vol. i, p. 353. Macmillan & Co. 



XIV INTRODUCTION 

and the world is so completely out of joint that, were it not 
for conscience, he would be an atheist or a pantheist." 

All this brings us back to the question of the processes 
which make his style a model and a wonder for us. It has 
been said with truth that his slightest sentence has value ; 
his very dedications and prefaces have a charm which can 
hardly be analyzed, and which can be imitated only if one 
has cultivated the interior germ which blossoms in outward 
grace and courtesy. A lute, — and a very exquisitely mod- 
ulated lute in Chaucer's time, — the English language came 
in Newman's hands to have the power of a great organ, with 
a stop for every thought, emotion, or mood that cultivated 
human nature is capable of expressing. Stevenson and Pater 
have refined English style, — the lessons of Euphues and 
the French school of " preciousness " ^ were not lost on 
them, — but they are more self-conscious in their efforts 
for art's sake than Newman. Art for art's sake was nothing 
to him ; he worked only to express the very bloom of the 
truth that was in him, and to express that truth with the 
exactness he intended it to have. 

To study Newman with profit, the student must remember 
two things : that his main object was to produce a sure effect 
by the use of words. This from a literary point of view was 
an artistic intention. All great painters, sculptors, writers, 
musicians, orators, preachers have had it. Raphael and 
Murillo, Praxiteles and Can ova, Bach and Wagner, Demos- 
thenes and Webster, Savonarola and Massillon, — all had 
the artistic intention, which means that their art shall pro- 
duce the influence they intended it to produce. In reading 
carefully the selections in this volume, the student will re- 
member this, and make up his mind as to the effect New- 
man wants to make. This will require some thought ; but 
then this book is not intended for the thoughtless. It will 
give the student what he puts into it, and somewhat more. 

1 " Preciousness," borrowed from the French " prdcieuse," a 
lady of the type of Roxane in Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac, 



INTRODUCTION XV 

The second thing to be kept well in hand is that every artist 
has his technique, which he improves just as a skilled 
mechanic improves his tools. Rhetoric books, I repeat, are 
merely tool boxes. They have no other value. Newman's 
business was, when he had determined just what effect he 
intended to produce, to use the right tool for producing it. 
You will find Newman accused of over-subtlety and a lack 
of straightforwardness, simply because he had learned the 
use of language so well that he never said more or less 
than he intended to say. He was absolutely master of his 
artistic intention as well as of his technical processes. As an 
example of his power of words, of his exactness, a little 
note will serve. It is taken from Mr. Wilfred Meynell's 
The Letters of Half a Lifetime, It was written in answer 
to Mr. Greenhill's question as to what the last two lines of 
Lead, Kindly Light meant. 

The Oratory, January 18, 1879. 

My dear Mr. Greenhill : — You flatter me by your 
question ; but I think it was Keble who, when asked it in his 
own case, answered that poets were not bound to be critics, 
or to give a sense to what they had written ; and though I 
am not like him a poet, at least I may plead that I am 
not bound to remember my own meaning, whatever it was, 
at the end of almost fifty years. 

Anyhow there must be a statute of limitation for writers 
of verse, or it would be quite a tyranny if, in an art which 
is the expression not of truth but of imagination and senti- 
ment, one were obliged to be ready for examination on the 
transient state of mind which came upon one when home- 
sick, or sea-sick, or in any other way sensitive or excited. 

This is perfectly straightforward and simple. A poet like 
Pope and perhaps one or two others would not have dared 
to be either so frank or so exact. Let us take another note 
of his as an example of the scrupulous exactness, even 



XVI INTEODUCTION 

in deep feeling, of his use of words. It is a short letter 
written to Mr. Edward Heneage Bering, on the death of his 
wife, in 1876. The loss that Newman alludes to is that of 
Father Ambrose St. John of the Oratory. 

My dear Mr. Bering: — I have felt for you very 
much. There are wounds of the spirit which never close, 
and are intended in God's mercy to bring us nearer to Him, 
and to prevent us leaving Him, by their very perpetuity. 
Such wounds, then, may almost be taken as a pledge, or at 
least as a ground for humble trust, that God will give us the 
great gift of perseverance to the end. As she has now passed 
the awful stream which we all have to ford, and is safe, 
so in the fact of having been taken from you, she seems 
to give you an intimation that you are to pass it safely also 
when your time comes, and you are to meet her again, then 
forever. Your losing her here is thus the condition of your 
meeting her hereafter. 

This is how I comfort myself in my own great bereave- 
ments. I lost last year my dearest friend unexpectedly. I 
never had so great a loss. He had been my life, under God, 
for thirty-two years. I don't expect the wound will ever 
heal, but from my heart I bless God, and would not have 
it otherwise, for I am sure that the bereavement is one of 
those Bivine Providences necessary for my attaining that 
Heavenly Rest which he, through God's mercy, has already 
secured. 

So cheer up, and try to do God's will in all things ac- 
cording to the day, as I pray to be able to do myself. 

The writer of this letter of consolation never said more 
or less than he intended to say in all sincerity. He knew 
ivhat he wanted to say, and his whole life had been given 
to learning how to say it. The Reverend Charles Kingsley's 
attack on him, which fortunately brought out the Apologia 
Pro Vita Stca, was due to the fact that the writer, who had 
the sledge-hammer manner of expression, had little sense 



INTR OB UCTION xvu 

of the exquisite value of words. It was Mr. Justin McCarthy 
who applied " the scimitar of Saladin " to the manner of 
Newman and the "battle-axe of Richard " to that of Kings- 
ley, recalling the scene between the two monarchs in Sir 
Walter Scott's The Talisman. Mr. Alpheus Snow speaks 
of " his usual method of suggestion rather than of direct and 
full statement, evidently through caution lest he might be- 
come polemic or give occasion for controversy." Mr. Snow 
sees further than Dr. Abbott or Dr. Whyte, two critics of 
Newman's manner. There are times when suggestion is 
better than a full statement. The artist in conversation 
knows that this delicate art, which shows signs of revival, 
soon becomes unkind, uncharitable, and brutal, if every- 
thing that the speaker thinks ought to be said is said with- 
out reserve. The good talker not only makes his point, but 
makes it suggestively when the occasion requires. And by 
the way, careful talking, artistic, cultivated talking, which 
need not lack spontaneity, is an excellent training for 
good writing. 

Cicero, we all know, was one of Newman's models ; but 
a study of good examples of Cicero in comparison with 
Newman will show that Newman rather absorbed than imi- 
tated. Cicero's great periods were evidently written to the 
sound of music. Art, refined, conscious art, reaches its 
highest point of the grand manner, in Cicero's best orations. 
Newman's periodicity is not the periodicity of Cicero. If it 
were, Newman's style would not be English in genius. It 
would be exotic, as Carlyle's is. It is best studied by com- 
parison. It has the admirable sentence-structure of Macaulay, 
improved in varied cadence and in simplicity ; the exactness 
of De Quincey ; the Saxon quality of John Bunyan, which is 
clear when it is not archaic ; and a personal quality which 
is unique, the result of temperament and art which seem 
to have become one. The student would do well to read, in 
comparison with these selections, some pieces in the Memories 
and Portraits of Robert Louis Stevenson and some in 
Walter Pater's Appreciations, Though these pages are 



XViil INTRODUCTION 

intended for students of literary style, the editor is con- 
vinced that no serious reader can consider them, even tech- 
nically, without having his ideals corroborated and new- 
hopes and aspirations nourished. 

Maurice Francis Egan. 



CHEONOLOGICAL OUTLINE OF NEW- 
MAN'S LIFE 

1801. Born in London, February 21. 

1808. Went to school at Ealing under Dr. Nicholas. 

1816. Published a magazine, The Beholder^ which ran through 
forty numbers. 

1817. Went into residence at Oxford. (Trinity College.) 
1822. Made a Fellow of Oriel. 

1824. Took Anglican Orders and accepted the Curacy of St. 
Clement's. 

1825. Appointed Vice-principal of Alban Hall by Bishop 
Whately. 

1828. Appointed Vicar of St. Mary's, Oxford. 

1832. Finished The History of the Arians and went abroad for 
his health. Wrote many of his poems, including Lead, 
Kindly Light y on this voyage. 

1833. The Oxford Movement begun by Keble's sermon on the 
"National Apostasy.'' The issue of the Tracts for the 
Times immediately followed. 

1841. Published the famous Tract 90. 

1845. Was received into the Catholic Church at Littlemore. 

1846. Went to Rome and was ordained priest. 

1850. Founded the London Oratory with Father Faber as Rector. 

1854. Was appointed Rector of the Catholic University at Dublin. 

1864. Wrote the Apologia Pro Vita Sua, 

1865. Wrote The Dream of Gerontius. 

1879. Created Cardinal Deacon of the Holy Roman Church by 

Leo XIII. 
1890. Died at the Oratory, Edgbaston, Birmingham, England. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

^ Abbott, Edwin A. The Anglican Career of Cardinal New- 
man. 2 vols. London, 1892. 
^ Barry, Rev. William. Newman. Illustrated. New York, 
1904. 
Gates, Lewis E. Selections from the Prose Writings of John 

Henry Newman. New York, 1895. 
HuTTON, Richard Holt. Cardinal Newman. Boston, 1890. 
KiNGSLEY, Rev. Charles. " What, then, does Dr. Newman 

mean f " London, 1864. 
Lilly, William S. Characteristics from the Writings of John 
Henry Newman, being selections personal, historical, philo- 
sophical, and religious, from his various works, arranged with 
the author's approval. New York, 1876. 
^ Newman, (short life.) Dictionary of National Biography, 

London. 
Meynell, Wilfrid, (John Oldcastle.) Catholic Life and Let- 
^ ters of Cardinal Newman. With notes on the Oxford Move- 

ment and its men. London, (undated.) Portraits, facsimile 
autograph, and copies of dedications. 
^ MozLEY, Anne. Letters and Correspondence of John Henry 
Newman. 2 vols. London, 1891. 
MozLEY, J. B. Letters. London, 1885. 

MozLEY, Thomas. Reminiscences, chiefly of Oriel College in 
the Oxford Movement. 2 vols. Boston, 1882. 
,. Newman, John Henry. My Campaign in Ireland. 

Letters on the Subject of the Catholic University in Ireland 

(unpublished). 
Parochial and Plain Sermons. 1873. 
Sermons on Subjects of the Day. 1871. 
^ University Sermons. 

Sermons to Mixed Congregations. 

Occasional Sermons. 

Lectures on the Prophetical Offices of the Church, 

Discussions and Arguments. 

Pamphlets. 

1. Suffragan Bishops. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY xxi 

2. Letter to a Magazine. 
^ 3. Letter to Faussett 
4' Letter to J elf. 

5. Letter to the Bishop of Oxford (out of print). 
^ Idea of a University. 

^ Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine. 
Annotated Translation of Athanasius. 
Lectures on Justif cation, 
i^ Lectures on the Difficulties of Anglicans, with Letter to Dr* 
Pusey. 
Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics. 
Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent, 
Two Essays on Miracles. 
Essays Critical and Historicaly with Notes, 
^ Theological Tracts. 
^ The Arians of the Fourth Century. 
Historical Sketches. 
Loss and Gain. 
Callista. 

Verses on Various Occasions. 
Apologia Pro Vita Sua. 
Letter to the Duke of Norfolk. 
^- Newman, Francis W. Contributions Chiefly to the Early HiS" 
tory of Cardinal Newman, with Comments. London, 1891. 
Selections from Newman, (prose.) New York, 1906. 
Snow, Alpheus Henry. A Study of the Life and Writings- of 
John Henry Newman. Indianapolis, 1892. 
i^ Thureau-Dangin, Paul (of the French Academy). La Re- 
naissance Catholique en Angleterre au XIX Siecle. Premiere 
Partie, Newman et le Mouvement d^ Oxford. Paris, 1899. Trois- 
ieme Partie, De la Mort de Wiseman a la Mort de Manning, 
1865-1892. Paris, 1906. 
Ward, Wilfrid. William George Ward and the Oxford Move- 
ment. London, 1889. 

William George Ward and the Catholic Revival. London, 
1893. 
j^Whyte, Alexander, D. D. Newman: an Appreciation. In 
two lectures, with the choicest passages of his writings 
selected and arranged. The appendix contains six of His 
Eminence's letters not hitherto published. New York, 
1903. 



SELECTIONS FROM NEWMAN 

I 

FROM *< APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA'' 

THE YOUNG MIND OF NEWMAN 

I WAS brought up from a child to take great delight 
in reading the Bible ; but I had no formed religious 
convictions till I was fifteen. Of course I had a perfect 
knowledge of my Catechism. 

After I was grown up, I put on paper my recollec- 
tions of the thoughts and feelings on religious subjects, 
which 1 had at the time that I was a child and a 
boy, — such as had remained on my mind with suffi- 
cient prominence to make me then consider them worth 
recording. Out of these, written in the Long Vacation 
of 1820, and transcribed with additions in 1823, I 
select two, which are at once the most definite among 
them, and also have a bearing on my later convic- 
tions. 

1. "I used to wish the Arabian Tales were true : 
my imagination ran on unknown influences, on magical 
powers, and talismans. ... I thought life might be a 
dream, or I an Angel, and all this world a deception, 
my fellow-angels by a playful device concealing them- 
selves from me, and deceiving me with the semblance 
of a material world." 

Again : " Reading in the Spring of 1816 a sentence 
from [Dr. Watts's] Remnants of Time^ entitled ^ the 



2 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Saints unknown to the world,' to the effect, that ' there 
is nothing in their figure or countenance to distinguish 
them,' &c., &c., I supposed he spoke of Angels who 
lived in the world, as it were disguised." 

2. The other remark is this : " I was very supersti- 
tious, and for some time previous to my conversion " 
[when I was fifteen] " used constantly to cross myseK 
on going into the dark." 

Of course I must have got this practice from some 
external source or other : but I can make no sort of 
conjecture whence ; and certainly no one had ever 
spoken to me on the subject of the Catholic religion, 
which I only knew by name. The French master was 
an emigre Priest, but he was simply made a butt, as 
French masters too commonly were in that day, and 
spoke English very imperfectly. There was a Catholic 
family in the village, old maiden ladies we used to 
think ; but I knew nothing about them. I have of 
late years heard that there were one or two Catholic 
boys in the school ; but either we were carefully kept 
from knowing this, or the knowledge of it made simply 
no impression on our minds. My brother will bear 
witness how free the school was from Catholic ideas. 

I had once been into Warwick Street Chapel, with 
my father, who, I believe, wanted to hear some piece 
of music ; all that I bore away from it was the recol- 
lection of a pulpit and a preacher, and a boy swinging 
a censer. 

When . I was at Littlemore, I was looking over old 
copy-books of my school days, and I found among them 
my first Latin verse-book ; and in the first page of it 
there was a device which almost took my breath away 
with surprise. I have the book before me now, and 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 3 

have just been showing it to others. I have written 
in the first page, in my school-boy hand, " John H. 
Newman, February 11th, 1811, Verse Book;" then 
follow my first Verses. Between " Verse " and '' Book " 
I have drawn the figure of a solid cross upright, and 
next to it is, what may indeed be meant for a necklace, 
but what I cannot make out to be anything else than 
a set of beads suspended, with a little cross attached. 
At this time I was not quite ten years old. I suppose 
I got these ideas from some romance, Mrs. Radcliffe's 
or Miss Porter's ; or from some religious picture ; but 
the strange thing is, how, among the thousand objects 
which meet a boy's eyes, these in particular should so 
have fixed themselves in my mind, that I made them 
thus practically my own. I am certain there was no- 
thing in the churches I attended, or the prayer books 
I read, to suggest them. It must be recollected that 
Anglican churches and prayer books were not decorated 
in those days as I believe they are now. 

When I was fourteen, I read Paine's Tracts against 
the Old Testament^ and found pleasure in thinking 
of the objections which were contained in them. Also, 
I read some of Hume's Essays ; and perhaps that on 
Miracles. So at least I gave my Father to understand ; 
but perhaps it was a brag. Also, I recollect copying 
out some French verses, perhaps Voltaire's, in denial 
of the immortality of the soul, and saying to myself 
something like " How dreadful, but how plausible ! " 

When I was fifteen, (in the autumn of 1816,) a 
great change of thought took place in me. I fell under 
the influences of a definite Creed, and received into 
my intellect impressions of dogma, which, through 
God's mercy, have never been effaced or obscured. 



4 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Above and beyond the conversations and sermons of 
the excellent man, long dead, the Rev. Walter Mayers, 
of Pembroke College, Oxford, who was the human 
means of this beginning of divine faith in me, was the 
effect of the books which he put into my hands, all of 
the school of Calvin. One of the first books I read 
was a work of Romaine's ; I neither recollect the title 
nor the contents, except one doctrine, which of course 
I do not include among those which I believe to have 
come from a divine source, viz. the doctrine of final 
perseverance. I received it at once, and believed that 
the inward conversion of which I was conscious, (and 
of which I still am more certain than that I have hands 
and feet,) would last into the next life, and that I was 
elected to eternal glory. I have no consciousness that 
this belief had any tendency whatever to lead me to be 
careless about pleasing God. I retained it till the age 
of twenty-one, when it gradually faded away ; but I be- 
lieve that it had some influence on my opinions, in the 
direction of those childish imaginations which I have 
already mentioned, viz. in isolating me from the objects 
which surrounded me, in confirming me in my mistrust 
of the reality of material phenomena, and making me 
rest in the thought of two and two only absolute and 
luminously self-evident beings, myself and my Creator; 
— for while I considered myself predestined to salva- 
tion, my mind did not dwell upon others, as fancying 
them simply passed over, not predestined to eternal 
death. I only thought of the mercy to myself. 

The detestable doctrine last mentioned is simply 
denied and abjured, unless my memory strangely de- 
ceives me, by the writer who made a deeper impression 
on my mind than any other, and to whom (humanly 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 5 

speaking) I almost owe my soul, — Thomas Scott of 
Aston Sandford. I so admired and delighted in his 
writings, that, when I was an Under-graduate, I thought 
of making a visit to his Parsonage, in order to &ee a 
man whom I so deeply revered. I hardly think I could 
have given up the idea of this expedition, even after I 
had taken my degree ; for the news of his death in 
1821 came upon me as a disappointment as well as a 
sorrow. I hung upon the lips of Daniel Wilson, after- 
wards Bishop of Calcutta, as in two sermons at St. 
John's Chapel he gave the history of Scott's life and 
death. I had been possessed of his Force of Truth 
and JEssays from a boy ; his Commentary I bought 
when I was an Under-graduate. 

What, I suppose, will strike any reader of Scott's 
history and writings, is his bold unworldliness and 
vigorous independence of mind. He followed truth 
wherever it led him, beginning with Unitarianism, and 
ending in a zealous faith in the Holy Trinity. It was 
he who first planted deep in my mind that funda- 
mental truth of religion. With the assistance of Scott's 
SJssays^ and the admirable work of Jones of Nayland, 
1 made a collection of Scripture texts in proof of the 
doctrine, with remarks (I think) of my own upon them, 
before I was sixteen ; and a few months later I drew 
up a series of texts in support of each verse of the 
Athanasian Creed. These papers I have still. 

Besides his unworldliness, what I also admired in 
Scott was his resolute opposition to Antinomianism, 
and the minutely practical character of his writings. 
They show him to be a true Englishman, and I deeply 
felt his influence ; and for years I used almost as pro- 
verbs what I considered to be the scope and issue of 



b PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Ills doctrine, Holiness rather than peace^ and Growth 
the only evidence of life, 

Calvinists make a sharp separation between the elect 
and the world ; there is much in this that is cognate or 
parallel to the Catholic doctrine ; but they go on to say, 
as I understand them, very differently from Catholicism, 
— that the converted and the unconverted can be dis- 
criminated by man, that the justified are conscious o£ 
their state of justification, and that the regenerate can- 
not fall away. Catholics on the other hand shade and 
soften the awful antagonism between good and evil, 
which is one of their dogmas, by holding that there are 
different degrees of justification, that there is a great 
difference in point of gravity between sin and sin, that 
there is the possibility and the danger of falling away, 
and that there is no certain knowledge given to any one 
that he is simply in a state of grace, and much less 
that he is to persevere to the end : — of the Calvinistic 
tenets the only one which took root in my mind was 
the fact of heaven and hell, divine favour and divine 
wrath, of the justified and the unjustified. The notion 
that the regenerate and the justified were one and the 
same, and that the regenerate, as such, had the gift of 
perseverance, remained with me not many years, as I 
have said already. 

This main Catholic doctrine of the warfare between 
the city of God and the powers of darkness was also 
deeply impressed upon my mind by a work of a charac- 
ter very opposite to Calvinism, Law's Serious Call. 

From this time I have held with a full inward assent 
and belief the doctrine of eternal punishment, as de- 
livered by our Lord Himself, in as true a sense as I 
hold that of eternal happiness ; though I have tried in 



APOLOGIA PEO VITA SUA 7 

various ways to make that truth less terrible to the 
imagination. 

Now I come to two other works, which produced a 
deep impression on me in the same Autumn of 1816, 
when I was fifteen years old, each contrary to each, 
and planting in me the seeds of an intellectual incon- 
sistency which disabled me for a long course of years. 
I read Joseph Milner's Church History^ and was no- 
thing short of enamoured of the long extracts from St. 
Augustine, St. Ambrose, and the other Fathers which 
I found there. I read them as being the religion of the 
primitive Christians : but simultaneously with Milner 
I read Newton On the Prophecies^ and in consequence 
became most firmly convinced that the Pope was the 
Antichrist predicted by Daniel, St. Paul, and St. John. 
My imagination was stained by the effects of this 
doctrine up to the year 1843 ; it had been obliterated 
from my reason and judgment at an earlier date ; but 
the thought remained upon me as a sort of false con- 
science. Hence came that conflict of mind, which so 
many have felt besides myself ; — leading some men 
to make a compromise between two ideas, so incon- 
sistent with each other, — driving others to beat out 
the one idea or the other from their minds, — and end- 
ing in my own case, after many years of intellectual 
unrest, in the gradual decay and extinction of one of 
them, — I do not say in its violent death, for why 
should I not have murdered it sooner, if I murdered 
it at all ? 

I am obliged to mention, though I do it with great 
reluctance, another deep imagination, which at this time, 
the autumn of 1816, took possession of me, — there 
can be no mistake about the fact ; viz. that it would be 



8 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the will of God that I should lead a single life. This 
anticipation, which has held its ground almost continu- 
ously ever since, — with the break of a month now and 
a month then, up to 1829, and, after that date, with- 
out any break at all, — was more or less connected in 
my mind with the notion, that my calling in life would 
require such a sacrifice as celibacy involved ; as, for in- 
stance, missionary work among the heathen, to which 
I had a great drawing for some years. It also strength- 
ened my feeling of separation from the visible world, 
of which I have spoken above. 

In 1822 I came under very different influences from 
those to which I had hitherto been subjected. At that 
time, Mr. Whately, as he was then, afterwards Arch- 
bishop of Dublin, for the few months he remained in 
Oxford, which he was leaving for good, showed great 
kindness to me. He renewed it in 1825, when he be- 
came Principal of Alban Hall, making me his Vice- 
Principal and Tutor. Of Dr. Whately I will speak 
presently: for from 1822 to 1826 I saw most of the 
present Provost of Oriel, Dr. Hawkins, at that time 
Vicar of St. Mary's ; and, when I took orders in 1824 
and had a curacy in Oxford, then, during the Long 
Vacations, I was especially thrown into his company. 
I can say with a full heart that I love him, and have 
never ceased to love him ; and I thus preface what 
otherwise might sound rude, that in the course of the 
many years in which we were together afterwards, he 
provoked me very much from time to time, though I 
am perfectly certain that I have provoked him a great 
deal more. Moreover, in me such provocation was 
unbecoming, both because he was the Head of my 
College, and because, in the first years that I knew 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 9 

him, he had been In many ways of great service to my 
mind. 

He was the first who taught me to weigh my words, 
and to be cautious in my statements. He led me to 
that mode of limiting and clearing my sense in discus- 
sion and in controversy, and of distinguishing between 
cognate ideas, and of obviating mistakes by antici- 
pation, which to my surprise has been since consid- 
ered, even in quarters friendly to me, to savour of the 
polemics of Rome. He is a man of most exact mind 
himself, and he used to snub me severely, on reading, 
as he was kind enough to do, the first Sermons that I 
wrote, and other compositions which I was engaged 
upon. 

Then as to doctrine, he was the means of great addi- 
tions to my belief. As I have noticed elsewhere, he 
gave me the Treatise on Apostolical Preaching^ by 
Sumner, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, from 
which I was led to give up my remaining Calvinism, 
and to receive the doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration. 
In many other ways too he was of use to me, on sub- 
jects semi-religious and semi-scholastic. 

It was Dr. Hawkins too who taught me to anticipate 
that, before many years were over, there would be an 
attack made upon the books and the canon of Scripture. 
I was brought to the same belief by the conversation 
of Mr. Blanco White, who also led me to have freer 
views on the subject of inspiration than were usual in 
the Church of England at the time. 

There is one other principle, which I gained from Dr. 
Hawkins, more directly bearing upon Catholicism, than 
any that I have mentioned ; and that is the doctrine 
of Tradition. When I was an Under-graduate, I heard 



10 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

him preach in the University Pulpit his celebrated ser- 
mon on the subject, and recollect how long it appeared 
to me, though he was at that time a very striking 
preacher ; but, when I read it and studied it as his gift, 
it made a most serious impression upon me. He does 
not go one step, I think, beyond the high Anglican 
doctrine, nay he does not reach it ; but he does his 
work thoroughly, and his view was in him original, and 
his subject was a novel one at the time. He lays down 
a proposition, self-evident as soon as stated, to those 
who have at all examined the structure of Scripture, 
viz. that the sacred text was never intended to teach 
doctrine, bub only to prove it, and that, if we would 
learn doctrine, we must have recourse to the formu- 
laries of the Church ; for instance to the Catechism, 
and to the Creeds. He considers, that, after learning 
from them the doctrines of Christianity, the inquirer 
must verify them by Scripture. This view, most true 
in its outline, most fruitful in its consequences, opened 
upon me a large field of thought. Dr. Whately held 
it too. One of its effects was to strike at the root of 
the principle on which the Bible Society was set up. 
I belonged to its Oxford Association ; it became a 
matter of time when I should withdraw my name from 
its subscription-list, though I did not do so at once. 

It is with pleasure that I pay here a tribute to the 
memory of the Rev. William James, then Fellow of 
Oriel ; who, about the year 1823, taught me the doc- 
trine of Apostolical Succession, in the course of a walk, 
I think, round Christ Church meadow; I recollect being 
somewhat impatient of the subject at the time. 

It was at about this date, I suppose, that I read 
Bishop Butler's Analogy; the study of which has been 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 11 

to SO many, as it was to me, an era in their religious 
opinions. Its inculcation of a visible Church, the oracle 
of truth and a pattern of sanctity, of the duties of 
external religion, and of the historical character of Re- 
velation, are characteristics of this great work which 
strike the reader at once ; for myseK, if I may attempt 
to determine what I most gained from it, it lay in two 
points, which I shall have an opportunity of dwelling 
on in the sequel ; they are the underlying principles of 
a great portion of my teaching. First, the very idea 
of an analogy between the separate works of God leads 
to the conclusion that the system which is of less im- 
portance is economically or sacramentally connected 
with the more momentous system/ and of this conclu- 
sion the theory, to which I was inclined as a boy, viz. 
the unreality of material phenomena, is an ultimate 
resolution. At this time I did not make the distinction 
between matter itself and its phenomena, which is so 
necessary and so obvious in discussing the subject. 
Secondly Butler's doctrine that Probability is the guide 
of life, led me, at least under the teaching to which 
a few years later I was introduced, to the question of 
the logical cogency of Faith, on which I have written 
so much. Thus to Butler I trace those two principles 
of my teaching, which have led to a charge against me 
both of fancifulness and of scepticism. 

And now as to Dr. Whately. I owe him a great 
deal. He was a man of generous and warm heart. He 
was particularly loyal to his friends, and to use the 
common phrase, " all his geese were swans." While 
I was still awkward and timid in 1822, he took me by 

^ It is significant that Butler begins his work with a quotation 
from Origen. 



12 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the hand, and acted towards me the part of a gentle 
and encouraging instructor. He, emphatically, opened 
my mind, and taught me to think and to use my rea- 
son. After being first noticed by him in 1822,1 became 
very intimate with him in 1825, when I was his Vice- 
Principal at Alban Hall. I gave up that office in 1826, 
when I became Tutor of my College, and his hold upon 
me gradually relaxed. He had done his work towards 
me or nearly so, when he had taught me to see with 
my own eyes and to walk with my own feet. Not that 
I had not a good deal to learn from others still, but I 
influenced them as well as they me, and co-operated 
rather than merely concurred with them. As to Dr. 
Whately, his mind was too different from mine for us 
to remain long on one line. I recollect how dissatisfied 
he was with an Article of mine in the London Review, 
which Blanco White, good-humouredly, only called 
Platonic. When I was diverging from him in opinion, 
(which he did not like,) I thought of dedicating my 
first book to him, in words to the effect that he had not 
only taught me to think, but to think for myself. He 
left Oxford in 1831 ; after that, as far as I can recol- 
lect, I never saw him but twice, — when he visited the 
University ; once in the street in 1834, once in a room 
in 1838. From the time that he left, I have always felt 
a real affection for what I must call his memory ; for, at 
least from the year 1834, he made himself dead to me. 
He had practically indeed given me up from the time 
that he became Archbishop in 1831 ; but in 1834 a cor- 
respondence took place between us, which, though con- 
ducted especially on his side in a friendly spirit, was 
the expression of differences of opinion which acted as 
a final close to our intercourse. My reason told me that 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 13 

it was impossible we could have got on together longer, 
had he stayed at Oxford ; yet I loved him too much to 
bid him farewell without pain. After a few years had 
passed, I began to believe that his influence on me in 
a higher respect than intellectual advance, (I will not 
say through his fault,) had not been satisfactory. I 
believe that he has inserted sharp things in his later 
works about me. They have never come in my way, 
and I have not thought it necessary to seek out what 
would pain me so much in the reading. 

What he did for me in point of religious opinion, 
was, first, to teach me the existence of the Church, as 
a substantive body or corporation ; next, to fix in me 
those anti-Erastian views of Church polity, which were 
one of the most prominent features of the Tractarian 
movement. On this point, and, as far as I know, on 
this point alone, he and Hurrell Froude intimately 
sympathized, though Froude's development of opinion 
here was of a later date. In the year 1826, in the 
course of a walk, he said much to me about a work 
then just published, called Letters on the Church hy 
an Episcopalian. He said that it would make my blood 
boil. It was certainly a most powerful composition. 
One of our common friends told me, that, after reading 
it, he could not keep still, but went on walking up and 
down his room. It was ascribed at once to Whately; 
I gave eager expression to the contrary opinion ; but 
I found the belief of Oxford in the affirmativ.e to be 
too strong for me ; rightly or wrongly I yielded to the 
general voice ; and I have never heard, then or since, 
of any disclaimer of authorship on the part of Dr. 
Whately. 

The main positions of this able essay are these : first, 



14 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

that Church and State should be independent of each 
other : - — he speaks of the duty of protesting " against 
the profanation of Christ's kingdom, by that double 
usurpation^ the interference of the Church in tem- 
porals, of the State in spirituals," p. 191 ; and, secondly, 
that the Church may justly and by right retain its 
property, though separated from the State. "The 
clergy," he says, p. 133, "though they ought not to be 
the hired servants of the Civil Magistrate, may justly 
retain their revenues ; and the State, though it has no 
right of interference in spiritual concerns, not only is 
justly entitled to support from the ministers of religion, 
and from all other Christians, but would, under the 
system I am recommending, obtain it much more effect- 
ually." The author of this work, whoever he may be, 
argues out both these points with great force and in- 
genuity, and with a thoroughgoing vehemence, which 
perhaps we may refer to the circumstance, that he 
wrote, not in propria persona^ and as thereby answer- 
able for every sentiment that he advanced, but in the 
professed character of a Scotch Episcopalian. His work 
had a gradual, but a deep effect on my mind. 

I am not aware of any other religious opinion which 
I owe to Dr. Whately. In his special theological tenets 
I had no sympathy. In the next year, 1827, he told 
me he considered that I was Arianizing. The case was 
this : though at that time I had not read Bishop Bull's 
Defensio nor the Fathers, I was just then very strong 
for that ante-Nicene view of the Trinitarian doctrine, 
which some writers, both Catholic and non-Catholic, 
have accused of wearing a sort of Arian exterior. This 
is the meaning of a passage in Froude's Remains^ in 
which he seems to accuse me of speaking against the 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 15 

Athanasian Creed. I had, contrasted the two aspects 
of the Trinitarian doctrine, which are respectively pre- 
sented by the Athanasian Creed and the Nicene. My 
criticisms were to the effect that some of the verses of 
the former Creed were unnecessarily scientific. This is 
a specimen of a certain disdain for Antiquity which 
had been growing on me now for several years. It 
showed itself in some flippant language against the 
Fathers in the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana^ about 
whom I knew little at the time, except what I had learnt 
as a boy from Joseph Milner. In writing on the Scrip- 
ture Miracles in 1825-6, 1 had read Middleton On the 
Miracles of the Early Church and had imbibed a por- 
tion of his spirit. 

The truth is, I was beginning to prefer intellect- 
ual excellence to moral ; I was drifting in the direction 
of the Liberalism of the day. I was rudely awakened 
from my dream at the end of 1827 by two great blows 
— illness and bereavement. 

AT HOME AND ABROAD 

While I was engaged in writing my work upon the 
Arians, great events were happening at home and 
abroad, which brought out into form and passionate 
expression the various beliefs which had so gradually 
been winning their way into my mind. Shortly before, 
there had been a Revolution in France ; the Bourbons 
had been dismissed : and I held that it was unchristian 
for nations to cast off their governors, and, much more, 
sovereigns who had the divine right of inheritance. 
Again, the great Reform Agitation w^as going on 
around me as I wrote. The Whigs had come into 
power ; Lord Grey had told the Bishops to set their 



16 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

house in order, and some of the Prelates had been 
insulted and threatened in the streets of London. The 
vital question was, how were we to keep the Church 
from l^eing liberalized? there was such apathy on the 
subject in some quarters, such imbecile alarm in others; 
the true principles of Churchmanship seemed so radi- 
cally decayed, and there was such distraction in the 
councils of the Clergy. Blomfield, the Bishop of London 
of the day, an active and open-hearted man, had been 
for years engaged in diluting the high orthodoxy of 
the Church by the introduction of members of the 
Evangelical body into places of influence and trust. 
He had deeply offended men who agreed in opinion 
with myself, by an off-hand saying (as it was reported) 
to the effect that belief in the Apostolical succession 
had gone out with the Non-jurors. " We can count 
you," he said to some of the gravest and most vener- 
ated persons of the old school. And the Evangelical 
party itself, with their late successes, seemed to have 
lost that simplicity and unworldliness which I admired 
so much in Milner and Scott. It was not that I did 
not venerate such men as Ryder, the then Bishop of 
Lichfield, and others of similar sentiments, who were 
not yet promoted out of the ranks of the Clergy, but 
I thought little of the Evangelicals as a class. I 
thought they played into the hands of the Liberals. 
With the Establishment thus divided and threatened, 
thus ignorant of its true strength, I compared that 
fresh vigorous Power of which I was reading in the 
first centuries. In her triumphant zeal on behalf of 
that Primeval Mystery, to which I had had so great 
a devotion from my youth, I recognized the movement 
of my Spiritual Mother. " Incessu patuit Dea." The 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 17 

self^conquest of her Ascetics, the patience of her Mar- 
tyrs, the irresistible determination of her Bishops, the 
joyous swing of her advance, both exalted and abashed 
me. I said to myself, " Look on this picture and on 
that ; " I felt affection for my own Church, but not 
tenderness ; I felt dismay at her prospects, anger and 
scorn at her do-nothing perplexity. I thought that if 
Liberalism once got a footing within her, it was sure 
of the victory in the event. I saw that Reformation 
principles were powerless to rescue her. As to leaving 
her, the thought never crossed my imagination ; still 
I ever kept before me that there was something greater 
than the Established Church, and that that was the 
Church Catholic and Apostolic, set up from the begin- 
ning, of which she was but the local presence and the 
organ. She was nothing, unless she was this. She 
must be dealt with strongly, or she would be lost. 
There was need of a second reformation. 

At this time I was disengaged from College duties, 
and my health had suffered from the labour involved 
in the composition of my Volume. It was ready for 
the Press in July, 1832, though not published till the 
end of 1833. I was easily persuaded to join Hurrell 
Froude and his Father, who were going to the south 
of Europe for the health of the former. 

We set out in December, 1832. It was during this 
expedition that my Verses which are in the Lyra A2J0S' 
tolica were written ; — a few indeed before it, but 
not more than one or two of them after it. Exchanging, 
as I was, definite Tutorial work, and the literary quiet 
and pleasant friendships of the last six years, for foreign 
countries and an unknown future, I naturally was led to 
think that some inward changes, as well as some larger 



18 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

course of action, were coming upon me. At Whitchurch, 
while waiting for the down mail to Falmouth, I wrote 
the verses about my Guardian Angel, which begin with 
these words : " Are these the tracts of some unearthly- 
Friend? " and which go on to speak of " the vision " 
which haunted me : — that vision is more or less 
brought out in the whole series of these compositions. 
I went to various coasts of the Mediterranean ; 
parted with my friends at Rome ; went down for the 
second time to Sicily without companion, at the end 
of April ; and got back to England by Palermo in the 
early part of July. The strangeness of foreign life 
threw me back into myself ; I found pleasure in his- 
torical sites and beautiful scenes, not in men and man- 
ners. We kept clear of Catholics throughout our tour. 
I had a conversation with the Dean of Malta, a most 
pleasant man, lately dead ; but it was about the 
Fathers, and the Library of the great church. I knew 
the Abbate Santini, at Rome, who did no more than 
copy for me the Gregorian tones. Froude and I made 
two calls upon Monsignor (now Cardinal) Wiseman 
at the CoUegio Inglese, shortly before we left Rome. 
Once we heard him preach at a church in the Corso. 
I do not recollect being in a room with any other eccle- 
siasts, except a Priest at Castro-Giovanni in Sicily, who 
called on me when I was ill, and with whom I wished 
to hold a controversy. As to Church Services, we 
attended the Tenebrae, at the Sestine, for the sake of 
the Miserere ; and that was all. My general feeling 
was, " All, save the spirit of man, is divine." I saw 
nothing but what was external ; of the hidden life of 
Catholics 1 knew nothing. I was still more driven back 
into myself, and felt my isolation. England was in my 



APOLOGIA PBO VITA SUA 19 

thoughts solely, and the news from England came 
rarely and imperfectly. The Bill for the Suppression 
of the Irish Sees was in progress, and filled my mind. 
I had fierce thoughts against the Liberals. 

It was the success of the Liberal cause which fretted 
me inwardly. I became fierce against its instruments 
and its manifestations. A French vessel was at Algiers ; 
I would not even look at the tri-colour. On my return, 
though forced to stop twenty-four hours at Paris, I 
kept indoors the whole time, and all that I saw of that 
beautiful city was what I saw from the Diligence. The 
Bishop of London had already sounded me as to my 
filling one of the Whitehall preacherships, which he 
had just then put on a new footing ; but I was indig- 
nant at the line which he was taking, and from my 
Steamer I had sent home a letter declining the appoint- 
ment by anticipation, should it be offered to me. At 
this time I was specially annoyed with Dr. Arnold, 
though it did not last into later years. Some one, I 
think, asked, in conversation at Rome, whether a cer- 
tain interpretation of Scripture was Christian ? it was 
answered that Dr. Arnold took it ; I interposed, " But 
is he a Christian ? " The subject went out of my head at 
once ; when afterwards I was taxed with it, I could say no 
more in explanation, than (what I believe was the fact) 
that I must have had in mind some free views of Dr. 
Arnold about the Old Testament : — I thought I must 
have meant, " Arnold answers for the interpretation, 
but who is to answer for Arnold ? " It was at Rome, 
too, that we began the Lyra Apostolica which appeared 
monthly in the British Magazine. The motto shows 
the feeling of both Froude and myself at the time : we 
borrowed from M. Bunsen a Homer, and Froude chose 



20 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the words in which Achilles, on returning to the battle, 
says, " You shall know the difference, now that I am 
back again." 

Especially when I was left by myself, the thought 
came upon me that deliverance is wrought, not by the 
many but by the few, not by bodies but by persons. 
Now it was, I think, that I repeated to myself the 
words, which had ever been dear to me from my school 
days, "Exoriare aliquis!" — now too, that Southey's 
beautiful poem of Thalaha^ for which I had an immense 
liking, came forcibly to my mind. I began to think 
that I had a mission. There are sentences of my letters 
to my friends to this effect, if they are not destroyed. 
When we took leave of Monsignor Wiseman, he had 
courteously expressed a wish that we might make 
a second visit to Rome ; I said with great gravity, 
'' We have a work to do in England." I went down 
at once to Sicily, and the presentiment grew stronger. 
I struck into the middle of the island, and fell ill of 
a fever at Leonforte. My servant thought that I was 
dying, and begged for my last directions. I gave them, 
as he wished ; but I said, "I shall not die." I repeated, 
''I shall not die, for I have not sinned against light, 
I have not sinned against light." I never have been 
able quite to make out what I meant. 

I got to Castro-Giovanni, and was laid up there for 
nearly three weeks. Towards the end of May I left 
for Palermo, taking three days for the journey. Before 
starting from my inn in the morning of May 26th or 
27th, I sat down on my bed, and began to sob vio- 
lently. My servant, who had acted as my nurse, asked 
what ailed me. I could only answer him, ''I have a 
work to do in England." 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 21 

I was acMng to get home ; yet for want of a vessel 
I was kept at Palermo for three weeks. I began to 
visit the Churches, and they calmed my impatience, 
though I did not attend any services. I knew nothing 
of the Presence of the Blessed Sacrament there. At 
last I got off in an orange boat, bound for Marseilles. 
Then it was that I wrote the lines, "Lead, kindly light," 
which have since become well known. We were be- 
calmed a whole week in the Straits of Bonifacio. I was 
writing verses the whole time of my passage. At length 
I got to Marseilles, and set off for England. The fa- 
tigue of travelling was too much for me, and I was laid 
up for several days at Lyons. At last I got off again, 
and did not stop night or day, (except a compulsory 
delay at Paris,) till I reached England, and my mother's 
house. My brother had arrived from Persia only a few 
hours before. This was on the Tuesday. The fol- 
lowing Sunday, July 14th, Mr. Keble preached the 
Assize Sermon in the University Pulpit. It was pub- 
lished under the title of National Apostasy, I have 
ever considered and kept the day, as the start of the 
religious movement of 1833. 

THE LAST PAGES OF THE " APOLOGIA " 

There is only one other subject, which I think it 
necessary to introduce here, as bearing upon the vague 
suspicions which are attached in this country to the 
Catholic Priesthood. It is one of which my accusers 
have before now said much, — the charge of reserve and 
economy. They found it in no slight degree on what I 
have said on the subject in my History of the Arians, 
and in a note upon one of my Sermons in which I refer 
to it. The principle of Reserve is also advocated by an 



22 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

admirable writer in two numbers of the Tracts for the 
Times^ and of these I was the Editor. 

Now, as to the Economy itself, it is founded upon the 
words of our Lord, " Cast not your pearls before swine ; " 
and it was observed by the early Christians, more or 
less, in their intercourse with the heathen populations 
among whom they lived. In the midst of the abomin- 
able idolatries and impurities of that fearful time, the 
Rule of the Economy was an imperative duty. But 
that rule, at least as I have explained and recommended 
it, in anything that I have written, did not go beyond 
(1) the concealing the truth when we could do so with- 
out deceit, (2) stating it only partially, and (3) repre- 
senting it under the nearest form possible to a learner 
or inquirer, when he could not possibly understand it 
exactly. I conceive that to draw Angels with wings is 
an instance of the third of these economical modes ; 
and to avoid the question, " Do Christians believe in a 
Trinity ? " by answering, " They believe in only one 
God," would be an instance of the second. As to the 
first, it is hardly an Economy, but comes under what is 
called the Disciplina Arcani, The second and third 
economical modes Clement calls lying ; meaning that a 
partial truth is in some sense a lie, as is also a repre- 
sentative truth. And this, I think, is about the long 
and the short of the ground of the accusation which 
has been so violently urged against me, as being a pa- 
tron of the Economy. 

Of late years I have come to think, as I believe most 
writers do, that Clement meant more than I have said. 
I used to think he used the word " lie " as an hyper- 
bole, but I now believe that he, as other early Fathers, 
thought that, under certain circumstances, it was lawful 



APOLOGIA PEO VITA SUA 23 

to tell a lie. This doctrine I never maintained, though 
I used to think, as I do now, that the theory of the 
subject is surrounded with considerable difficulty ; and 
it is not strange that I should say so, considering that 
great English writers declare without hesitation that 
in certain extreme cases, as to save life, honour, or even 
property, a lie is allowable. And thus I am brought to 
the direct question of truth, and of the truthfulness of 
Catholic priests generally in their dealings with the 
world, as bearing on the general question of their hon- 
esty, and of their internal belief in their religious 
professions. 

It would answer no purpose, and it would be depart- 
ing from the line of writing which I have been observing 
all along, if I entered into any formal discussion on 
this question; what I shall do here, as I have done in 
the foregoing pages, is to give my own testimony on the 
matter in question, and there to leave it. Now first I 
will say, that, when I became a Catholic, nothing struck 
me more at once than the English out-spoken manner 
of the Priests. It was the same at Oscott, at Old Hall 
Green, at Ushaw; there was nothing of that smooth- 
ness, or mannerism, which is commonly imputed to 
them, and they were more natural and unaffected than 
many an Anglican clergyman. The many years, which 
have passed since, have only confirmed my first im- 
pression. I have ever found it in the priests of this 
Diocese ; did I wish to point out a straightforward 
Englishman, I should instance the Bishop, who has, to 
our great benefit, for so many years presided over it. 

And next, I was struck, when I had more opportu- 
nity of judging of the Priests, by the simple faith in 



24 PBOSE AND FOETBY OF NEWMAN 

the Catholic Creed and system, of which they alwaj^s 
gave evidence, and which they never seemed to feel, in 
any sense at all, to be a burden. And now that I have 
been in the Church nineteen years, I cannot recollect 
hearing of a single instance in England of an infidel 
priest. Of course there are men from time to time, who 
leave the Catholic Church for another religion, but I 
am speaking of cases, when a man keeps a fair outside 
to the world and is a hollow hypocrite in his heart. 

I wonder that the self-devotion of our priests does 
not strike a Protestant in this point of view. What 
do they gain by professing a Creed, in which, if their 
enemies are to be credited, they really do not believe? 
What is their reward for committing themselves to a 
life of self-restraint and toil, and perhaps to a pre- 
mature and miserable death ? The Irish fever cut off 
between Liverpool and Leeds thirty priests and more, 
young men in the flower of their days, old men who 
seemed entitled to some quiet time after their long toil. 
There was a bishop cut off in the North ; but what had 
a man of his ecclesiastical rank to do with the drudgery 
and danger of sick calls, except that Christian faith and 
charity constrained him? Priests volunteered for the 
dangerous service. It was the same with them on the 
first coming of the cholera, that mysterious awe-inspir- 
ing infliction. If they did not heartily believe in the 
Creed of the Church, then I will say that the remark 
of the Apostle had its fullest illustration : — "If in 
this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men 
most miserable." What could support a set of hypo- 
crites in the presence of a deadly disorder, one of them 
following another in long order up the forlorn hope, 
and one after another perishing ? And such, I may say, 



APOLOGIA PBO VITA SUA 25 

in Its substance, is every Mission-Priest's life. He is 
ever ready to sacrifice himself for his people. Night and 
day, sick or well himself, in all weathers, ofE he is, on 
the news of a sick call. The fact of a parishioner 
dying without the Sacraments through his fault is 
terrible to him ; why terrible, if he has not a deep abso- 
lute faith, which he acts upon with a free service? 
Protestants admire this, when they see it ; but they do 
not seem to see as clearly, that it excludes the very no- 
tion of hypocrisy. 

Sometimes, when they reflect upon it, it leads them 
to remark on the wonderful discipline of the Catholic 
priesthood ; they say that no Church has so well ordered 
a clergy, and that in that respect it surpasses their own ; 
they wish they could have such exact discipline among 
themselves. But is it an excellence which can be pur- 
chased ? is it a phenomenon which depends on nothing 
else than itself, or is it an effect which has a cause ? 
You cannot buy devotion at a price. " It hath never 
been heard of in the land of Chanaan, neither hath it 
been seen in Theman. The children of Agar, the mer- 
chants of Meran, none of these have known its way." 
What then is that wonderful charm, which makes a 
thousand men act all in one way, and infuses a prompt 
obedience to rule, as if they were under some stern 
military compulsion ? How difficult to find an answer, 
unless you will allow the obvious one, that they believe 
intensely what they profess ! 

I cannot think what it can be, in a day like this, 
which keeps up the prejudice of this Protestant coun- 
try against us, unless it be the vague charges which are 
drawn from our books of Moral Theology ; and with 



2G PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

a short notice of the work in particular which by our 
accusers is especially thrown into our teeth, I shall 
bring these observations to a close. 

St. AKonso Liguori, then, it cannot be denied, lays 
down that an equivocation, (that is, a play upon words, 
in which one sense is taken by the speaker, and another 
sense intended by him for the hearer,) is allowable, if 
there is a just cause, that is, in an extraordinary case, 
and may even be confirmed by an oath. I shall give 
my opinion on this point as plainly as any Protestant 
can wish ; and therefore I avow at once that in this de- 
partment of morality, much as I admire the high points 
of the Italian character, I like the English rule of con- 
duct better ; but, in saying so, I am not, as will shortly 
be seen, saying any thing disrespectful to St. Alfonso, 
who was a lover of truth, and whose intercession I 
trust I shall not lose, though, on the matter under con- 
sideration, I follow other guidance in preference to 
his. 

Now I make this remark first: — great English 
authors, Jeremy Taylor, Milton, Paley, Johnson, men 
of very different schools of thought, distinctly say, that 
under certain extraordinary circumstances it is allow- 
able to tell a lie. Taylor says : " To tell a lie for charity, 
to save a man's life, the life of a friend, of a husband, 
of a prince, of a useful and a public person, hath not 
only been done at all times, but commended by great 
and wise and good men. Who would not save his 
father's life, at the charge of a harmless lie, from per- 
secutors or tyrants?" Again, Milton says: "What 
man in his senses would deny, that there are those 
whom we have the best grounds for considering that 
we ought to deceive, — as boys, madmen, the sick, the 



APOLOGIA PEO VITA SUA 27 

intoxicated, enemies, men in error, thieves? I would 
ask, by which of the commandments is a lie forbidden ? 
You will say, by the ninth. If then my lie does not 
injure my neighbour, certainly it is not forbidden by 
this commandment." Paley says : " There are false- 
hoods, which are not lies, that is, which are not crimi- 
nal." Johnson : " The general rule is, that truth should 
never be violated ; there must, however, be some ex- 
ceptions. If, for instance, a murderer should ask you 
which way a man is gone." 

Now, I am not using these instances as an argumen- 
turn ad hominem ; but the purpose to which I put 
them is this : — 

1. First, I have set down the distinct statements of 
Taylor, Milton, Paley, and Johnson : — now, would 
any one give ever so little weight to these statements, 
in forming a real estimate of the veracity of the writers, 
if they now were alive ? Were a man, who is so fierce 
with St. Alfonso, to meet Paley or Johnson to-morrow 
in society, would he look upon him as a liar, a knave, 
as dishonest and untrustworthy ? I am sure he would 
not. Why then does he not deal out the same measure 
to Catholic priests ? If a copy of Scavini, which speaks 
of equivocation as being in a just cause allowable, be 
found in a student's room, at Oscott, not Scavini him- 
self, but even the unhappy student, who has what a 
Protestant calls a bad book in his possession, is judged 
to be for life unworthy of credit. Are all Protestant 
text-books, which are used at the University, immacu- 
late ? Is it necessary to take for gospel every word of 
Aristotle's Ethics, or every assertion of Hey or Burnet 
on the Articles ? Are text-books the ultimate author- 
ity, or rather are they not manuals in the hands of a 



28 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

lecturer, and the groundwork of his remarks ? But, 
again, let us suppose, not the ease of a student, or of 
a professor, but of Scavini himself, or of St. Alfonso ; 
now here again I ask, since you would not scruple in 
holding Paley for an honest man, in spite of his defence 
of lying, why do you scruple at holding St. Alfonso 
honest ? I am perfectly sure that you would not scruple 
at Paley personally ; you might not agree with him, 
but you would not go further than to call him a bold 
thinker : then why should St. Alfonso's person be odi- 
ous to you, as well as his doctrine ? 

Now I wish to tell you why you are not afraid of 
Paley ; because, you would say, when he advocated lying, 
he was taking extreme or special cases. You would 
have no fear of a man who you knew had shot a burglar 
dead in his own house, because you know you are not 
a burglar : so you would not think that Paley had a 
habit of telling lies in society, because in the case of 
a cruel alternative he thought it the lesser evil to tell 
a lie. Then why do you show such suspicion of a Catho- 
lic theologian, who speaks of certain extraordinary cases 
in which an equivocation in a penitent cannot be visited 
by his confessor as if it were a sin ? for this is the exact 
point of the question. 

But again, why does Paley, why does Jeremy Taylor, 
when no practical matter is actually before him, lay 
down a maxim about the lawfulness of lying, which 
will startle most readers? The reason is plain. He is 
forming a theory of morals, and he must treat every 
question in turn as it comes. And this is just what St. 
Alfonso or Scavini is doing. You only try your hand 
yourself at a treatise on the rules of morality, and you 
will see how difficult the work is. What is the dejini- 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 29 

tion of a lie ? Can you give a better tlian that it is a sin 
against justice, as Taylor and Paley consider it ? but, i£ 
so, how can it be a sin at all, if your neighbour is not 
injured? If you do not like this definition, take an- 
other ; and then, by means of that, perhaps you will 
be defending St. Alfonso's equivocation. However, 
this is what I insist upon ; that St. Alfonso, as Paley, 
is considering the different portions of a large subject, 
and he must, on the subject of lying, give his judgment, 
though on that subject it is difficult to form any judg- 
ment which is satisfactory. 

But further still : you must not suppose that a phi- 
losopher or moralist uses in his own case the license 
which his theory itself would allow him. A man in his 
own person is guided by his own conscience ; but in 
drawing out a system of rules he is obliged to go by 
logic, and follow the exact deduction of conclusion from 
conclusion, and must be sure that the whole system is 
coherent and one. You hear of even immoral or irre- 
ligious books being written by men of decent character ; 
there is a late writer who says that David Hume's 
sceptical works are not at all the picture of the man, 
A priest might write a treatise which was really lax on 
the subject of lying, which might come under the con- 
demnation of the Holy See, as some treatises on that 
score have already been condemned, and yet in his own 
person be a rigorist. And, in fact, it is notorious from 
St. Alfonso's Life, that he, who has the repute of be- 
ing so lax a moralist, had one of the most scrupulous 
and anxious of consciences himself. Nay, further than 
this, he was originally in the Law, and on one occasion 
he was betrayed into the commission of what seemed 
like a deceit, though it was an accident ; and that was 



80 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the very occasion of his leaving the profession and 
embracing the religious life. 

The account of this remarkable occurrence is told us 
in his Life : — 

" Notwithstanding he had carefully examined over 
and over the details of the process, he was completely 
mistaken regarding the sense of one document, which 
constituted the right of the adverse party. The advo- 
cate of the Grand Duke perceived the mistake, but 
he allowed Alfonso to continue his eloquent address 
to the end without interruption ; as soon, however, as 
he had finished, he rose, and said with cutting cool- 
ness, * Sir, the case is not exactly what you suppose it 
to be ; if you will review the process, and examine 
this paper attentively, you will find there precisely 
the contrary of all you have advanced.' ' Willingly,' 
replied Alfonso, without hesitating ; ' the decision de- 
pends on this question — whether the fief were granted 
under the law of Lombardy, or under the French 
law.' The paper being examined, it was found that 
the Grand Duke's advocate was in the right. ' Yes,' 
said Alfonso, holding the paper in his hand, ' I am 
wrong, I have been mistaken.' A discovery so unex- 
pected, and the fear of being accused of unfair dealing 
filled him with consternation, and covered him with 
confusion, so much so, that every one saw his emotion. 
It was in vain that the President Caravita, who loved 
him, and knew his integrity, tried to console him, by 
telling him that such mistakes were not uncommon, 
even among the first men at the bar. Alfonso would 
listen to nothing, but, overwhelmed with confusion, 
his head sunk on his breast, he said to himself, ' World, 
I know you now ; courts of law, never shall you see 



APOLOGIA PBO VITA SUA 81 

me again ! ' And turning his back on the assembly, 
he withdrew to his own house, incessantly repeating to 
himself, 'World, I know you now.' What annoyed 
him most was, that having studied and restudied the 
process during a whole month, without having discov- 
ered this important flaw, he could not understand how 
it had escaped his observation." 

And this is the man, so easily scared at the very 
shadow of trickery, who is so flippantly pronounced to 
be a patron of lying. 

But, in truth, a Catholic theologian has objects in 
view which men in general little compass ; he is not 
thinking of himself, but of a multitude of souls, sick 
souls, sinful souls, carried away by sin, full of evil, 
and he is trying with all his might to rescue them from 
their miserable state ; and, in order to save them from 
more heinous sins, he tries, to the full extent that his 
conscience will allow him to go, to shut his eyes to 
such sins as are, though sins, yet lighter in character 
or degree. He knows perfectly well that, if he is as 
strict as he would wish to be, he shall be able to do 
nothing at all with the run of men ; so he is as indul- 
gent with them as ever he can be. Let it not be for 
an instant supposed, that I allow of the maxim of 
doing evil that good may come ; but, keeping clear of 
this, there is a way of winning men from greater sins 
by winking for the time at the less, or at mere impro- 
prieties or faults ; and this is the key to the difficulty 
which Catholic books of moral theology so often cause 
to the Protestant. They are intended for the Con- 
fessor, and Protestants view them as intended for the 
Preacher. 

2. And I observe upon Taylor, Milton, and Paley 



32 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

thus : What would a Protestant clergyman say to me, 
if I accused him of teaching that a lie was allowable ; 
and if, when he asked for my proof, I said in reply 
that such was the doctrine of Taylor and Milton ? 
Why, he would sharply retort, ''/am not bound by 
Taylor or Milton ; " and if I went on urging that 
" Taylor was one of his authorities," he would answer 
that Taylor was a great writer, but great writers were 
not therefore infallible. This is pretty much the answer 
which I make, when I am considered in this matter 
a disciple of St. Alfonso. 

I plainly and positively state, and without any re- 
serve, that I do not at all follow this holy and char- 
itable man in this portion of his teaching. There are 
various schools of opinion allowed in the Church : and 
on this point I follow others. I follow Cardinal Gerdil, 
and Natalis Alexander, nay, St. Augustine. I will 
quote one passage from Natalis Alexander : — " They 
certainly lie, who utter the words of an oath, without 
the will to swear or bind themselves : or who make 
use of mental reservations and equivocations in swear- 
ing, since they signify by words what they have not 
in mind, contrary to the end for which language was 
instituted, viz. as signs of ideas. Or they mean some- 
thing else than the words signify in themselves and the 
common custom of speech." And, to take an instance : 
I do not believe any priest in England would dream 
of saying, " My friend is not here ; " meaning, " He is 
not in my pocket or under my shoe." Nor should any 
consideration make me say so myself. I do not think 
St. Alfonso would in his own case have said so ; and 
he would have been as much shocked at Taylor and 
Paley, as Protestants are at him. 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 33 

And now, if Protestants wish to know what our real 
teaching is, as on other subjects, so on that of lying, 
let them look, not at our books of casuistry, but at our 
catechisms. Works on pathology do not give the best 
insight into the form and the harmony of the human 
frame ; and, as it is with the body, so is it with the 
mind. The Catechism of the Council of Trent was 
drawn up for the express purpose of providing preach- 
ers with subjects for their Sermons ; and, as my whole 
work has been a defence of myself, I may here say that 
I rarely preach a Sermon, but I go to this beautiful 
and complete Catechism to get both my matter and my 
doctrine. There we find the following notices about the 
duty of Veracity : — 

" ' Thou shalt not bear false witness,' &c. : let atten- 
tion be drawn to two laws contained in this command- 
ment : — the one, forbidding false witness ; the other 
bidding, that removing all pretence and deceits, we 
should measure our words and deeds by simple truth, 
as the Apostle admonished the Ephesians of that duty 
in these words : ' Doing truth in charity, let us grow 
in Him through all things.' 

" To deceive by a lie in joke or for the sake of com- 
pliment, though to no one there accrues loss or gain 
in consequence, nevertheless is altogether unworthy : 
for thus the Apostle admonishes, ' Putting aside lying, 
speak ye truth.' For therein is great danger of laps- 
ing into frequent and more serious lying, and from lies 
in joke men gain the habit of lying, whence they gain 
the character of not being truthful. And thence again, 
in order to gain credence to their words, they find it 
necessary to make a practice of swearing. 

^' IS^othing is more necessary [for us] than truth of 



34 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

testimony, in those things, which we neither know 
ourselves, nor can allowably be ignorant of, on which 
point there is extant that maxim of St. Augustine's : 
Whoso conceals the truth, and whoso puts forth a lie, 
each is guilty ; the one because he is not willing to do 
a service, the other because he has a wish to do a 
mischief. 

" It is lawful at times to be silent about the truth, 
but out of a court of law ; for in court, when a witness 
is interrogated by the judge according to law, the truth 
is wholly to be brought out. 

" Witnesses, however, must beware, lest, from over- 
confidence in their memory, they affirm for certain, 
what they have not verified. 

" In order that the faithful may with more good will 
avoid the sin of lying, the Parish Priest shall set 
before them the extreme misery and turpitude of this 
wickedness. For, in holy writ, the devil is called the 
father of a lie ; for, in that he did not remain in Truth, 
he is a liar, and the father of a lie. He will add, with 
the view of ridding men of so great a crime, the evils 
which follow upon lying ; and, whereas they are innu- 
merable, he will point out [at least] the sources and the 
general heads of these mischiefs and calamities, viz. 
1. How great is God's displeasure and how great His 
hatred of a man who is insincere and a liar. 2. What 
little security there is that a man who is specially hated 
by God may not be visited by the heaviest punishments. 
3. What more unclean and foul, as St. James says, 
than . . . that a fountain by the same jet should send 
out sweet water and bitter ? 4. For that tongue, which 
just now praised God, next, as far as in it lies, dis- 
honours Him by lying. 6. In consequence, liars are 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 35 

shut out from the possession of heavenly beatitude. 
6. That too is the worst evil of lying, that that disease 
of the mind is generally incurable. 

'' Moreover, there is this harm too, and one of vast 
extent, and touching men generally, that by insincerity 
and lying faith and truth are lost, which are the firm- 
est bonds of human society, and, when they are lost, 
supreme confusion follows in life, so that men seem in 
nothing to differ from devils. 

" Lastly, the Parish Priest will set those right who 
excuse their insincerity and allege the example of wise 
men, who, they say, are used to lie for an occasion. 
He will tell them, what is most true, that the wisdom 
of the flesh is death. He will exhort his hearers to 
trust in God, when they are in difficulties and straits, 
nor to have recourse to the expedient of a lie. 

" They who throw the blame of their own lie on 
those who have already by a lie deceived them, are to 
be taught that men must not revenge themselves, nor 
make up for one evil by another. . . ." 

There is much more in the Catechism to the same 
effect, and it is of universal obligation ; whereas the 
decision of a particular author in morals need not be 
accepted by any one. 

To one other authority I appeal on this subject, 
which commands from me attention of a special kind, 
for it is the teaching of a Father. It will serve to bring 
my work to a conclusion. 

" St. Philip," says the Roman Oratorian who wrote 
his Life, " had a particular dislike of affectation both 
in himself and others, in speaking, in dressing, or in 
anything else. 



36 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

" He avoided all ceremony which savoured of worldly 
compliment, and always showed himself a great stick- 
ler for Christian simplicity in everything ; so that, when 
he had to deal with men of worldly prudence, he did 
not very readily accommodate himself to them. 

" And he avoided, as much as possible, having any- 
thing to do with two-faced persons^ who did not go 
simply and straightforwardly to work in their trans- 
actions. 

" As for liars^ he could not endure therrij and he 
was continually reminding his spiritual children, to 
avoid them as they would a pestilencey 

These are the principles on which I have acted be- 
fore I was a Catholic ; these are the principles which,. 
I trust, will be my stay and guidance to the end. 

I have closed this history of myself with St. Philip's 
name upon St. Philip's feast-day ; and, having done 
so, to whom can I more suitably offer it, as a memo- 
rial of affection and gratitude, than to St. Philip's sons, 
my dearest brothers of this House, the Priests of the 
Birmingham Oratory, Ambrose St. John, Henry 
Austin Mills, Henry Bittleston, Edward Cas- 
WALL, William Paine Neville, and Henry Igna- 
tius Dudley Kyder ? who have been so faithful to 
me; who have been so sensitive of my needs; who 
have been so indulgent to my failings ; who have car- 
ried me through so many trials ; who have grudged 
no sacrifice, if I asked for it ; who have been so cheer- 
ful under discouragements of my causing ; who have 
done so many good works, and let me have the credit 
of them ; — with whom I have lived so long, with whom 
I hope to die. 



APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA 37 

And to you especially, dear Ambrose St. John ; 
whom God gave me, when He took every one else 
away ; who are the link between my old life and my 
new ; who have now for twenty-one years been so de- 
voted to me, so patient, so zealous, so tender ; who 
have let me lean so hard upon you ; who have watched 
me so narrowly ; who have never thought of yourself, 
if I was in question. 

And in you I gather up and bear in memory those 
familiar affectionate companions and counsellors, who 
in Oxford were given to me, one after another, to be 
my daily solace and relief ; and all those others, of 
great name and high example, who were my thorough 
friends, and showed me true attachment in times long 
past; and also those many younger men, whether 1 
knew them or not, who have never been disloyal to me 
by word or deed ; and of all these, thus various in 
their relations to me, those more especially who have 
since joined the Catholic Church. 

And I earnestly pray for this whole company, with 
a hope against hope, that all of us, who once were so 
united, and so happy in our union, may even now be 
brought at length, by the Power of the Divine Will, 
into One Fold and under One Shepherd. 

May 26, 1864. 
In Festo Corp. Christ. 



II 

REVEALED RELIGION 

There is another point on which my basis of argu- 
ment differs from Paley's. He argues on the principle 
that the credentials, which ascertain for us a message 
from above, are necessarily in their nature miraculous ; 
nor have I any thought of venturing to say otherwise. 
In fact, all professed revelations have been attended, 
in one shape or another, with the profession of mira- 
cles ; and we know how direct and unequivocal are 
the miracles of both the Jewish Covenant and of our 
own. However, my object here is to assume as little 
as possible as regards facts, and to dwell only on what 
is patent and notorious ; and therefore I will only 
insist on those coincidences and their cumulations, 
which, though not in themselves miraculous, do irre- 
sistibly force upon us, almost by the law of our nature, 
the presence of the extraordinary agency of Him whose 
being we already Acknowledge. Though coincidences 
rise out of a combination of general laws, there is no 
law of those coincidences ; they have a character of 
their own, and seem left by Providence in His own 
hands, as the channel by which, inscrutable to us. He 
may make known to us His will. 

For instance, if I am a believer in a God of Truth 
and Avenger of dishonesty, and know for certain that 
a market-woman, after calling on Him to strike her 
dead if she had in her possession a piece of money not 



BEVEALED RELIGION' 39 

hers, did fall down dead on the spot, and that the 
money was found in her hand, how can I call this a 
blind coincidence, and not discern in it an act of 
Providence over and above its general laws? So, cer- 
tainly, thought the inhabitants of an English town, 
when they erected a pillar as a record of such an event 
at the place where it occurred. And if a Pope excom- 
municates a great conqueror ; and he, on hearing the 
threat, says to one of his friends, " Does he think the 
world has gone back a thousand years ? does he sup- 
pose the arms will fall from the hands of my soldiers ? '' 
and within two years, on the retreat over the snows 
of Russia, as two contemporary historians relate, 
" famine and cold tore their arms from the grasp of 
the soldiers," "they fell from the hands of the bravest 
and most robust," and '' destitute of the power of 
raising them from the ground, the soldiers left them 
in the snow ; " is not this too, though no miracle, a 
coincidence so special, as rightly to be called a Divine 
judgment? So thinks Alison, who avows with religious 
honesty, that " there is something in these marvellous 
coincidences beyond the operation of chance, and which 
even a Protestant historian feels himself bound to 
mark for the observation of future years." And so, 
too, of a cumulation of coincidences, separately less 
striking ; when Spelman sets about establishing the 
fact of the ill-fortune which in many instances has 
followed upon acts of sacrilege among us, then, even 
though in many instances it has not followed, and in 
many instances he exaggerates, still there may be a 
large residuum of cases which cannot be properly re- 
solved into the mere accident of concurrent causes, but 
must in reason be considered the warning voice of 



40 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

God. So, at least, thought Gibson, Bishop of London, 
when he wrote, '' Many of the instances, and those 
too well-attested, are so terrible in the event, and in 
the circumstances so surprising, that no considering 
person can well pass them over." 

I think, then, that the circumstances under which 
a professed revelation comes to us, may be such as to 
impress both our reason and our imagination with 
a sense of its truth, even though no appeal be made 
to strictly miraculous intervention — in saying which 
I do not mean of course to imply that those circum- 
stances, when traced back to their first origins, are 
not the outcome of such intervention, but that the 
miraculous intervention addresses us at this day in the 
guise of those circumstances ; that is, of coincidences, 
which are indications, to the illative sense of those 
who believe in a Moral Governor, of His immediate 
Presence, especially to those who in addition hold with 
me the strong antecedent probability that, in His mercy, 
He will thus supernaturally present Himself to our 
apprehension. 

Now as to the fact ; has what is so probable in 
anticipation actually been granted to us, or have we 
still to look out for it ? It is very plain, supposing it 
has been granted, which among all the religions of the 
world comes from God : and if it is not that, a revela- 
tion is not yet given, and we must look forward to the 
future. There is only one Religion in the world which 
tends to fulfil the aspirations, needs, and foreshadow- 
ings of natural faith and devotion. It may be said, 
perhaps, that, educated in Christianity, I merely judge 
of it by its own principles ; but this is not the fact. 



BEVEALEB RELIGION 41 

For, in the first place, I have taken my idea of what 
a revelation must be, in good measure, from the actual 
religions of the world ; and as to its ethics, the ideas 
with which I come to it are derived not simply from 
the Gospel, but prior to it from heathen moralists, 
whom Fathers of the Church and Ecclesiastical writers 
have imitated or sanctioned ; and as to the intellectual 
position from which I have contemplated the subject, 
Aristotle has been my master. Besides, I do not here 
single out Christianity with reference simply to its 
particular doctrines or precepts, but for a reason which 
is on the surface of its history. It alone has a definite 
message addressed to all mankind. As far as I know, 
the religion of Mahomet has brought into the world no 
new doctrine whatever, except, indeed, that of its own 
divine origin ; and the character of its teaching is too 
exact a reflection of the race, time, place, and climate in 
which it arose, to admit of its becoming universal. The 
same dependence on external circumstances is charac- 
teristic, so far as I know, of the religions of the far East ; 
nor am I sure of any definite message from God to man 
which they convey and protect, though they may have 
sacred books. Christianity, on the other hand, is in 
its idea an announcement, a preaching ; it is the de- 
pository of truths beyond human discovery, momentous, 
practical, maintained one and the same in substance 
in every age from its first, and addressed to all man- 
kind. And it has actually been embraced and is found 
in all parts of the world, in all climates, among all 
races, in all ranks of society, under every degree of 
civilization, from barbarism to the highest cultivation 
of mind. Coming to set right and to govern the world, 
it has ever been, as it ought to be, in conflict with 



42 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

large masses of men, with the civil power, with physical 
force, with adverse philosophies ; it has had successes, 
it has had reverses ; but it has had a grand history, 
and has effected great things, and is as vigorous in its 
age as in its youth. In all these respects it has a dis- 
tinction in the world and a pre-eminence of its own ; 
it has upon it prima facie signs of divinity; I do not 
know what can be advanced by rival religions to match 
prerogatives so special ; so that I feel myseK justified 
in saying either Christianity is from God, or a revela- 
tion has not yet been given to us. 

It will not surely be objected, as a point in favour 
of some of the Oriental religions, that they are older 
than Christianity by some centuries ; yet, should it be 
so said, it must be recollected that Christianity is only 
the continuation and conclusion of what professes to 
be an earlier revelation, which may be traced back into 
prehistoric times, till it is lost in the darkness that 
hangs over them. As far as we know, there never was 
a time when that revelation was not, — a revelation 
continuous and systematic, with distinct representatives 
and an orderly succession. And this, I suppose, is far 
more than can be said for the religions of the East. 

Here, then, I am brought to the consideration of 
the Hebrew nation and the Mosaic religion, as the 
first step in the direct evidence for Christianity. 

The Jews are one of the few Oriental nations who 
are known in history as a people of progress, and their 
line of progress is the development of religious truth. 
In that their own line they stand by themselves among 
all the populations, not only of the East, but of the 
West. Their country may be called the classical home 
of the religious principle, as Greece is the home of 



MEVEALED RELIGION 43 

intellectual power, and Eome that of political and prac- 
tical wisdom. Theism is their life ; it is emphatically 
their natural religion, for they never were without it, 
and were made a people by means of it. This is a 
phenomenon singular and solitary in history, and must 
have a meaning. If there be a God and Providence, 
it must come from Him, whether immediately or indi- 
rectly ; and the people themselves have ever maintained 
that it has been His direct work, and has been recog- 
nized by Him as such. We are apt to treat pretences 
to a divine mission or to supernatural powers as of 
frequent occurrence, and on that score to dismiss them 
from our thoughts ; but we cannot so deal with Judaism. 
When mankind had universally denied the first lesson 
of their conscience by lapsing into polytheism, is it 
a thing of slight moment that there was just one excep- 
tion to the rule, that there was just one people who, first 
by their rulers and priests, and afterwards by their own 
unanimous zeal, professed, as their distinguishing doc- 
trine, the Divine Unity and Government of the world, 
and that, moreover, not only as a natural truth, but as 
revealed to them by that God Himself of whom they 
spoke, — who so embodied it in their national polity, 
that a Theocracy was the only name by which it could 
be called? It was a people founded and set up in Theism, 
kept together by Theism, and maintaining Theism for a 
period from first to last of 2000 years, till the dissolution 
of their body politic ; and they have maintained it since 
in their state of exile and wandering for 2000 years 
more. They begin with the beginning of history, and 
the preaching of this august dogma begins with them. 
They are its witnesses and confessors, even to torture 
and death ; on it and its revelation are moulded their 



44 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

laws and government ; on this their politics, philosophy, 
and literature are founded ; of this truth their poetry is 
the voice, pouring itself out in devotional compositions 
which Christianity, through all its many countries and 
ages, has been unable to rival; on this aboriginal truth, 
as time goes on, prophet after prophet bases his further 
revelations, with a sustained reference to a time when, 
according to the secret counsels of its Divine Object 
and Author, it is to receive completion and perfection, 
— till at length that time comes. 

The last age of their history is as strange as their 
first. When that time of destined blessing came, 
which they had so accurately marked out, and were so 
carefully waiting for — a time which found them, in 
fact, more zealous for their Law, and for the dogma it 
enshrined, than they ever had been before — then, 
instead of any final favour coming on them from above, 
they fell under the power of their enemies, and were 
overthrown, their holy city razed to the ground, their 
polity destroyed, and the remnant of their people 
cast off to wander far and away through every land 
except their own, as we find them at this day ; lasting 
on, century after century, not absorbed in other 
populations, not annihilated, as likely to last on, as 
unlikely to be restored, as far as outward appearances 
go, now as a thousand years ago. What nation has 
so grand, so romantic, so terrible a history? Does it 
not fulfil the idea of, what the nation calls itself, 
a chosen people, chosen for good and evil ? Is it not 
an exhibition in a course of history of that primary 
declaration of conscience, as I have been determining 
it, ''With the upright Thou shalt be upright, and with 
the f reward Thou shalt be froward " ? It must have 



BEVEALED BELIGION 45 

a meaning, if there is a God. We know what was 
their witness of old time ; what is their witness now ? 

Why, I say, was it that, after so memorable a career, 
when their sins and sufferings were now to come to an 
end, when they were looking out for a deliverance and 
a Deliverer, suddenly all was reversed for once and for 
all? They were the favoured servants of God, and 
yet a peculiar reproach and note of infamy is affixed 
to their name. It was their belief that His protection 
was unchangeable, and that their Law would last for 
ever; — it was their consolation to be taught by an 
uninterrupted tradition, that it could not die, except 
by changing into a new self, more wonderful than it 
was before ; — it was their faithful expectation that 
a promised King was coming, the Messiah, who would 
extend the sway of Israel over all people; — it was 
a condition of their covenant, that, as a reward to 
Abraham, their first father, the day at length should 
dawn when the gates of their narrow land should open, 
and they should pour out for the conquest and occupa- 
tion of the whole earth ; — and, I repeat, when the day 
came, they did go forth, and they did spread into all 
lands, but as hopeless exiles, as eternal wanderers. 

Are we to say that this failure is a proof that, after 
all, there was nothing providential in their history ? For 
myself, I do not see how a second portent obliterates a 
first ; and, in truth, their own testimony and their own 
sacred books carry us on towards a better solution of the 
difficulty. I have said they were in God's favour under 
a covenant, — perhaps they did not fulfil the conditions 
of it. This indeed seems to be their own account of 
the matter, though it is not clear what their breach of 
engagement was. And that in some way they did sin, 



46 PHOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

whatever their sin was, is corroborated by the well- 
known chapter in the Book of Deuteronomy, which so 
strikingly anticipates the nature of their punishment. 
That passage, translated into Greek as many as 360 
years before the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, has on it 
the marks of a wonderful prophecy; but I am not now 
referring to it as such, but merely as an indication that 
the disappointment, which actually overtook them at the 
Christian era, was not necessarily out of keeping with 
the original divine purpose, or again with the old pro- 
mise made to them, and their confident expectation of 
its fulfilment. Their national ruin, which came instead 
of aggrandizement, is described in that book, in spite 
of all promises, with an emphasis and minuteness which 
prove that it was contemplated long before, at least as 
a possible issue of the fortunes of Israel. Among other 
inflictions which should befall the guilty people, it was 
told them that they should fall down before their ene- 
mies, and should be scattered throughout all the king- 
doms of the earth ; that they never should have quiet 
in those nations, or have rest for the sole of their foot ; 
that they were to have a fearful heart and languishing 
eyes, and a soul consumed with heaviness ; that they 
Were to suffer wrong, and to be crushed at all times, 
and to be astonished at the terror of their lot ; that their 
sons and daughters were to be given to another people, 
and they were to look and to sicken all the day, and 
their life was ever to hang in doubt before them, and 
fear to haunt them day and night ; that they should 
be a proverb and a by-word of all people among whom 
they were brought ; and that curses were to come on 
them, and to be signs and wonders on them and their 
seed for ever. Such are some portions, and not the 



EEVEALED RELIGION 47 

most terrible, of this extended anathema ; and its par- 
tial accomplishment at an earlier date of their history- 
was a warning to them, when the destined time drew 
near, that, however great the promises made to them 
might be, those promises were dependent on the terms 
of the covenant which stood between them and their 
Maker, and that, as they had turned to curses at that 
former time, so they might turn to curses again. 

This grand drama, so impressed with the characters 
of supernatural agency, concerns us here only in its 
bearing upon the evidence for the divine origin of 
Christianity; and it is at this point that Christianity 
comes upon the historical scene. It is a notorious fact 
that it issued from the Jewish land and people ; and 
had it no other than this historical connexion with 
Judaism, it would have some share in the prestige of 
its original home. But it claims to be far more than 
this ; it professes to be the actual completion of the 
Mosaic Law, the promised means of deliverance and 
triumph to the nation, which that nation itself, as I 
have said, has since considered to be, on account of 
some sin or other, withheld or forfeited. It professes 
to be, not the casual, but the legitimate offspring, heir, 
and successor of the Mosaic Covenant, or rather to be 
Judaism itself, developed and transformed. Of course 
it has to prove its claim, as well as to prefer it; but if 
it succeeds in doing so, then all those tokens of the 
Divine Presence, which distinguish the Jewish history, 
at once belong to it, and are a portion of its creden- 
tials. 

And at least t\iQ prima facie y\&w oi its relations 
towards Judaism is in favour of these pretensions. It 
is an historical fact, that, at the very time that the Jews 



48 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

committed their unpardonable sin, whatever it was, and 
were driven out from their home to wander over the 
earth, their Christian brethren, born of the same stock, 
and equally citizens of Jerusalem, did also issue forth 
from the same home, but in order to subdue that same 
earth and make it their own ; that is, they undertook 
the very work which, according to the promise, their 
nation actually was ordained to execute; and, with a 
method of their own indeed, and with a new end, and 
only slowly and painfully, but still really and thor- 
oughly, they did it. And since that time the two 
children of the promise have ever been found together 
— of the promise forfeited and the promise fulfilled ; 
and whereas the Christian has been in high place, so 
the Jew has been degraded and despised — the one has 
been " the head," and the other " the tail ; " so that, 
to go no farther, the fact that Christianity actually has 
done what Judaism was to have done, decides the con- 
troversy, by the logic of facts, in favour of Christianity. 
The prophecies announced that the Messiah was to 
came at a definite time and place ; Christians point 
to Him as coming then and there, as announced ; they 
are not met by any counter-claim or rival claimant on 
the part of the Jews, only by their assertion that He 
did not come at all, though up to the event they had 
said He was then and there coming. Further, Chris- 
tianity clears up the mystery which hangs over Judaism, 
accounting fully for the punishment of the people, by 
specifying their sin, their heinous sin. If, instead of 
hailing their own Messiah, they crucified Him, then 
the strange scourge which has pursued them after the 
deed, and the energetic wording of the curse before it, 
are explained by the very strangeness of their guilt ; — 



JREVEALEB BELIGJON 49 

or rather, their sin is their punishment ; for in reject- 
ing their Divine King, they ipso facto lost the living 
principle and tie of their nationality. Moreover, we 
see what led them into error ; they thought a triumph 
and an empire were to be given to them at once, which 
were given indeed eventually, but by the slow and 
gradual growth of many centuries and a long warfare. 
On the whole, then, I observe, on the one hand, that, 
Judaism having been the channel of religious tradi- 
tions which are lost in the depth of their antiquity, of 
course it is a great point for Christianity to succeed in 
proving that it is the legitimate heir to that former 
religion. Nor is it, on the other, of less importance to 
the significance of those early traditions to be able 
to determine that they were not lost together with 
their original store-house, but were transferred, on 
the failure of Judaism, to the custody of the Christian 
Church. And this apparent correspondence between 
*the two is in itself a presumption for such correspond- 
ence being real. Next, I observe, that if the history of 
Judaism is so wonderful as to suggest the presence 
of some special divine agency in its appointments and 
fortunes, still more wonderful and divine is the history 
of Christianity ; and again it is more wonderful still, 
that two such wonderful creations should span almost 
the whole course of ages, during which nations and 
states have been in existence, and should constitute 
a professed system of continued intercourse between 
earth and heaven from first to last amid all the vicis- 
situdes of human affairs. This phenomenon again 
carries on its face, to those who believe in a God, the 
probability that it has that divine origin which it pro- 
fesses to have ; and, (when viewed in the light of the 



60 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

strong presumption which I have insisted on, that in 
God's mercy a revelation from Him will be granted to 
us, and of the contrast presented by other religions, 
no one of which professes to be a revelation direct, 
definite, and integral as this is,) — this phenomenon, 
I say, of cumulative marvels raises that probability, 
both for Judaism and Christianity, in religious minds, 
almost to a certainty. 



THE GROUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 

The Protestant, I say, laughs at the very idea of 
miracles or supernatural acts as occurring at this 
day; his First Principle is rooted in him; he repels 
from him the idea of miracles ; he laughs at the notion 
of evidence for them ; one is just as likely as another ; 
they are all false. Why? Because of his First Principle : 
there are no miracles since the Apostles. Here, in- 
deed, is a short and easy way of getting rid of the 
whole subject, not by reason, but by a First Principle 
which he calls reason. Yes, it is reason, granting 
his First Principle is true ; it is not reason, supposing 
his First Principle is false. It is reason, if the private 
judgment of an individual, or of a sect, or of a philo- 
sophy, or of a nation, be synonymous with reason ; it 
is not reason, if reason is something not local, nor 
temporal, but universal. Before he advances a step 
in his argument, he ought to prove his First Principle 
true ; he does not attempt to do so, he takes it for 
granted ; and he proceeds to apply it, gratuitous, 
personal, peculiar as it is, to all our accounts of 
miracles taken together, and thereupon and thereby 



THE GBOUNB OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 61 

triumphantly rejects them all. This, forsooth, is his 
spontaneous judgment, his instinctive feeling, his 
common sense, — a mere private opinion of his own, 
a Protestant opinion ; a lecture-room opinion ; not a 
world-wide opinion, not an instinct ranging through 
time and space, but an assumption and presumption, 
which, by education and habit, he has got to think as 
certain, as much of an axiom, as that two and two 
make four ; and he looks down upon us, and bids 
us consider ourselves beaten, all because the savour of 
our statements and narratives and reports and legends 
is inconsistent with his delicate Protestant sense, — 
all because our conclusions are different, not from our 
principles and premisses, but from his. 

And now for the structure he proceeds to raise on 
this foundation of sand. If, he argues, in matter of 
fact, there be a host of stories about relics and miracles 
circulated in the Catholic Church, which, as a matter 
of First Principle, cannot be true ; to what must we 
attribute them ? indubitably to enormous stupidity on 
the one hand, and enormous roguery on the other. 
This, observe, is an immediate and close inference : — 
clever men must see through the superstition ; those 
who do not see through it must be dolts. Further, 
since religion is the subject-matter of the alleged 
fictions, they must be what are called pious frauds, for 
the sake of gain and power. Observe, my Brothers, 
there is in the Church a vast tradition and testimony 
about miracles : how is it to be accounted for ? If 
miracles can take place, then the truth of the miracle 
will be a natural explanation of the report^ just as the 
fact of a man dying satisfactorily accounts for the 
news that he is dead ; but the Protestant cannot so 



52 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

explain it, because he thinks miracles cannot take 
place ; so he is necessarily driven, by way of account- 
ing for the report of them, to impute that report to 
fraud. He cannot help himself. I repeat it ; the 
whole mass of accusations which Protestants bring 
against us under this head, Catholic credulity, im- 
posture, pious frauds, hjrpocrisy, priestcraft, this vast 
and varied superstructure of imputation, you see, all 
rests on an assumption, on an opinion of theirs, for 
which they offer no kind of proof. What then, in 
fact, do they say more than this. If Protestantism be 
true, you Catholics are a most awful set of knaves? — 
Here, at least, is a most intelligible and undeniable 
position. 

Now, on the other hand, let me take our own side 
of the question, and consider how we ourselves stand 
relatively to the charge made against us. Catholics, 
then, hold the mystery of the Incarnation ; and the 
Incarnation is the most stupendous event which ever 
can take place on earth ; and after it and henceforth, 
I do not see how we can scruple at any miracle on the 
mere ground of its being unlikely to happen. No 
miracle can be so great as that which took place in 
the Holy House of Nazareth ; it is indefinitely more 
difficult to believe than all the miracles of the Brev- 
iary, of the Martyrology, of Saints' Lives, of legends, 
of local traditions, put together; and there is the 
grossest inconsistency on the very face of the matter, 
for any one so to strain out the gnat and to swallow 
the camel, as to profess what is inconceivable, yet to 
protest against what is surely within the limits of in- 
telligible hypothesis. If, through divine grace, we once 
are able to accept the solemn truth that the Supreme 



THE GROUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 53 

Being was born of a mortal woman, what is there to 
be imagined which can offend us on the ground of its 
marvellousness ? Thus, you see, it happens that, though 
First Principles are commonly assumed, not proved, 
ours in this case admits, if not of proof, yet of recom- 
mendation, by naeans of that fundamental truth which 
Protestants profess as well as we. When we start with 
assuming that miracles are not unlikely, we are put- 
ting forth a position which lies imbedded, as it were, 
and involved, in the great revealed fact of the Incar- 
nation. 

So much is plain on starting ; but more is plain too. 
Miracles are not only not unlikely, they are positively 
likely; and for this simple reason, because, for the 
most part, when God begins He goes on. We conceive 
that when He first did a miracle. He began a series ; 
what He commenced. He continued : what has been, 
will be. Surely this is good and clear reasoning. To 
my own mind, certainly, it is incomparably more diffi- 
cult to believe that the Divine Being should do one 
miracle and no more, than that He should do a thou- 
sand ; that He should do one great miracle only, than 
that He should do a multitude of less besides. This 
beautiful world of nature. His own work. He broke its 
harmony ; He broke through His own laws which He 
had imposed on it ; He worked out His purposes, not 
simply through it, but in violation of it. If He did this 
only in the lifetime of the Apostles, if He did it but 
once, eighteen hundred years ago and more, that iso- 
lated infringement looks as the mere infringement of 
a rule : if Divine Wisdom would not leave an infringe- 
ment, an anomaly, a solecism on His work. He might 
he expected to introduce a series of miracles, and turn 



54 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the apparent exception into an additional law of His 
providence. If the Divine Being does a thing once, 
He is, judging by human reason, likely to do it again. 
This surely is common sense. If a beggar gets food at 
a gentleman's house once, does he not send others 
thither after him ? If you are attacked by thieves once, 
do you forthwith leave your windows open at night ? 
If an acquaintance were convicted of a fraud, would 
you let that be the signal for reposing confidence in 
him, as a man who could not possibly deceive you? 
Nay, suppose you yourselves were once to see a miracle, 
would you not feel that experience to be like passing 
a line ? should you, in consequence of it, declare, " I 
never will believe another if I hear of one " ? would 
it not, on the contrary, predispose you to listen to a new 
report? would you scoff at it and caU it priestcraft 
for the reason that you had actually seen one with 
your own eyes ? I think you would not ; then I ask 
what is the difference of the argument, whether you 
have seen one or believe one ? You believe the Apos- 
tolic miracles, therefore be inclined beforehand to 
believe later ones. Thus you see, our First Principle, 
that miracles are not unlikely now, is not at all a 
strange one in the mouths of those who believe that 
the Supreme Being came miraculously into this world, 
miraculously united Himself to man's nature, passed 
a life of miracles, and then gave His Apostles a greater 
gift of miracles than He exercised Himself. So far on 
the principle itself ; and now, in the next place, see 
what comes of it. 

This comes of it, — that there are two systems 
going on in the world, one of nature, and one above 
nature ; and two histories, one of common events, and 



THE GROUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 55 

one of miracles ; and each system and each history- 
has its own order. When I hear of the miracle of a 
Saint, my first feeling would be of the same kind as 
if it were a report of any natural exploit or event. 
Supposing, for instance, I heard a report of the death 
of some public man ; it would not startle me, even if 
1 did not at once credit it, for all men must die. Did 
I read of any great feat of valour, I should believe 
it, if imputed to Alexander or Coeur de Lion. Did 
I hear of any act of baseness, I should disbelieve it, 
if imputed to a friend whom I knew and loved. And 
so, in like manner, were a miracle reported to me as 
wrought by a member of Parliament, or a Bishop of 
the Establishment, or a Wesleyan preacher, I should 
repudiate the notion : were it referred to a saint, or 
the relic of a saint, or the intercession of a saint, 
I should not be startled at it, though I might not at 
once believe it. And I certainly should be right in 
this conduct, supposing my First Principle be true. 
Miracles to the Catholic are facts of history and bio- 
graphy, and nothing else ; and they are to be regarded 
and dealt with as other facts ; and as natural facts, 
under circumstances, do not startle Protestants, so 
supernatural, under circumstances, do not startle the 
Catholic. They may or may not have taken place in 
particular cases ; he may be unable to determine which ; 
he may have no distinct evidence ; he may suspend 
his judgment, but he will say, " It is very possible ; " 
he never will say, " I cannot believe it." 

Take the history of Alfred : you know his wise, 
mild, beneficent, yet daring character, and his roman- 
tic vicissitudes of fortune. This great king has a 
number of stories, or, as you may call them, legends, 



56 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

told of him. Do you believe them all ? no. Do you, 
on the other hand, think them incredible? no. Do 
you call a man a dupe or a blockhead for believing 
them? no. Do you call an author a knave and a 
cheat who records them ? no. You go into neither 
extreme, whether of implicit faith or of violent re- 
probation. You are not so extravagant ; you see that 
they suit his character, they may have been ; yet this 
is so romantic, that has so little evidence, a third is 
so confused in dates or in geography, that you are in 
matter of fact indisposed towards them. Others are 
probably true, others certainly. Nor do you force 
every one to take your own view of particular stories ; 
you and your neighbours think differently about this 
or that in detail and agree to differ. There is in the 
Museum at Oxford, a jewel or trinket said to be 
Alfred's : it is shown to all comers : I never heard the 
keeper of the Museum accused of hypocrisy or fraud 
for showing, with Alfred's name appended, what he 
might or might not himself believe to have belonged 
to that great king : nor did I ever see any party of 
strangers, who were looking at it with awe, regarded 
by any self-complacent bystander with scornful com- 
passion. Yet the relic is not to a certainty Alfred's. 
The world pays civil honour to it on the probability ; 
we pay religious honour to relics, if so be, on the 
probability. Is the Tower of London shut against 
sightseers, because the coats of mail or pikes there 
may have half -legendary tales connected with them ? 
why then may not the country people come up in 
joyous companies, singing and piping, to see the Holy 
Coat at Treves ? There is our Queen again, who is 
so truly and justly popular ; she roves about in the 



THE GBOUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 67 

midst of tradition and romance ; she scatters myths 
and legends from her as she goes along; she is a 
being of poetry, and you might fairly be sceptical 
whether she had any personal existence. She is 
always at some beautiful, noble, bounteous work or 
other, if you trust the papers. She is doing alms- 
deeds in the Highlands; she meets beggars in her 
rides at Windsor; she writes verses in albums, or 
draws sketches, or is mistaken for the housekeeper 
by some blind old woman, or she runs up a hill, as if 
she were a child. Who finds fault with these things ? 
he would be a cynic, he would be white-livered, and 
would have gall for blood, who was not struck with 
this graceful, touching evidence of the love which her 
subjects bear her. Who could have the head, even if 
he had the heart, who could be so cross and peevish, 
who could be so solemn and perverse, as to say that 
some of the stories may be simple lies, and all of them 
might have stronger evidence than they carry with 
them ? Do you think she is displeased at them ? 
Why, then, should He, the Great Father, who once 
walked the earth, look sternly on the unavoidable 
mistakes of His own subjects and children in their 
devotion to Him and His ? Even granting they mis- 
take some cases in particular, from the infirmity of 
human nature, and the contingencies of evidence, 
and fancy there is or has been a miracle here or there 
when there is not ; — though a tradition, attached to 
a picture, or to a shrine, or to a well, be very doubtful ; 
— though one relic be sometimes mistaken for another, 
and St. Theodore stands for St. Eugenius, or St. 
Agathocles ; — still, once take into account our First 
Principle, that He is likely to continue miracles among 



68 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

US, which is as good as the Protestant's, and I do not 
see why He should feel much displeasure with us on 
account of this error, or should cease to work wonders 
in our behalf. In the Protestant's view, indeed, who 
assumes that miracles never are, our thaumatology is 
one great falsehood ; but that is his First Principle, 
as I have said so often, which he does not prove but 
assume. If Ae, indeed, upheld our system, or we held 
his principle, in either case he or we should be im- 
postors ; but though we should be partners to a fraud, 
if we thought like Protestants, we surely are not, 
because we think like Catholics. 

Such, then, is the answer which I make to those 
who would urge against us the multitude of miracles 
recorded in our Saints' Lives and devotional works, 
for many of which there is little evidence, and for 
some next to none. We think them true in the sense 
in which Protestants think the details of English his- 
tory true. When they say that, they do not mean to 
say there are no mistakes in it, but no mistakes of 
consequence, none which alter the general course 
of history. Nor do they mean they are equally sure of 
every part ; for evidence is fuller and better for some 
things than for others. They do not stake their credit 
on the truth of Froissart or Sully, they do not pledge 
themselves for the accuracy of Doddington or Walpole, 
they do not embrace as an Evangelist, Hume, Sharon 
Turner, or Macaulay. And yet they do not think it 
necessary, on the other hand, to commence a religious 
war against all our historical catechisms, and abstracts, 
and dictionaries, and tales and biographies, through 
the country ; they have no call on them to amend and 



THE GROUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 59 

expurgate books of arclieology, antiquities, heraldry, 
architecture, geography, and statistics, to rewrite our 
inscriptions, and to establish a censorship on all new 
publications for the time to come. And so as regards 
the miracles of the Catholic Church ; if, indeed, mira- 
cles never can occur, then, indeed, impute the narra- 
tives to fraud ; but till you prove they are not likely, 
we shall consider the histories which have come down 
to us true on the whole, though in particular cases they 
may be exaggerated or unfounded. Where, indeed, 
they can certainly be proved to be false, there we shall 
be bound to do our best to get rid of them ; but till 
that is clear, we shall be liberal enough to allow others 
to use their private judgment in their favour, as we 
use ours in their disparagement. For myself, lest I 
appear in any way to be shrinking from a determinate 
judgment on the claims of some of those miracles and 
relics, which Protestants are so startled at, and to be 
hiding particular questions in what is vague and gen- 
eral, I will avow distinctly, that, putting out of the 
question the hypothesis of unknown laws of nature 
(that is, of the professed miracle being not miracu- 
lous), I think it impossible to withstand the evidence 
which is brought for the liquefaction of the blood of 
St. Januarius at Naples, and for the motion of the 
eyes of the pictures of the Madonna in the Koman 
States. I see no reason to doubt the material of the 
Lombard crown at Monza ; and I do not see why the 
Holy Coat at Treves may not have been what it pro- 
fesses to be. I firmly believe that portions of the True 
Cross are at Rome and elsewhere, that the Crib of 
Bethlehem is at Rome, and the bodies of St. Peter and 
St. Paul also. I believe that at Rome too lies St. 



60 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Stephen, that St. Matthew lies at Salerno, and St. 
Andrew at Amalfi. I firmly believe that the relics 
of the saints are doing innumerable miracles and graces 
daily, and that it needs only for a Catholic to show 
devotion to any saint in order to receive special bene- 
fits from his intercession. I firmly believe that saints 
in their life-time have before now raised the dead to 
life, crossed the sea without vessels, multiplied grain 
and bread, cured incurable diseases, and superseded 
the operation of the laws of the universe in a multitude 
of ways. Many men, when they hear an educated man 
so speak, will at once impute the avowal to insan- 
ity, or to an idios3nicrasy, or to imbecility of mind, 
or to decrepitude of powers, or to fanaticism, or to hypo- 
crisy. They have a right to say so, if they will ; and 
we have a right to ask them why they do not say it 
of those who bow down before the Mystery of mys- 
teries, the Divine Incarnation. If they do not believe 
this, they are not yet Protestants ; if they do, let 
them grant that He who has done the greater may do 
the less. 

And now, Brothers of the Oratory, I have come to 
the end of a somewhat uninteresting, but a necessary 
discussion. Your lot is cast in the world ; you are 
not gathered together, as we are, into the home and 
under the shadow of St. Philip; you mix with men 
of all opinions. Where you see prejudice, there, in- 
deed, it is no use to argue; prejudice thinks its first 
principles self-evident. It can tell falsehoods to our 
dishonour by the score, yet suddenly it is so jealous 
of truth, as to be shocked at legends in honour of 
the saints. With prejudiced persons then, you will 



THE GBOUNJD OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 61 

make no way ; they will not look the question in the 
face; if they condescend to listen for a moment to 
your arguments it is in order to pick holes in them, 
not to ascertain their drift or to estimate their weight. 
But there are others of a different stamp of whom I 
spoke in the opening of this Lecture, candid, amiable 
minds, who wish to think well of our doctrines and 
devotions, but stumble at them. When you meet 
with such, ask them whether they are not taking 
their own principles and opinions for granted, and 
whether all they have to say against us is not con- 
tained in the proposition with which they start. En- 
treat them to consider how they know their existing 
opinions to be true ; whether they are innate and neces- 
sary; whether they are not local, national, or tem- 
porary ; whether they have ever spread over the earth, 
ever held nations together ; whether they have ever 
or often done a great thing. If they say that penances 
are absurd, or images superstitious, or infallibility 
impossible, or sacraments mere charms, or a priest- 
hood priestcraft, get them to put their ideas into 
shape and to tell you their reasons for them. Trace 
up their philosophy for them, as you have traced up 
their tradition ; the fault lies in the root ; every step 
of it is easy but the first. Perhaps you will make 
them Catholics by this process ; at least you will make 
them perceive what they believe and what they do 
not, and will teach them to be more tolerant of a Re- 
ligion which unhappily they do not see their way to 
embrace. 



62 FEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

WHO'S TO BLAME? 

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ATHENIANS 

Now at length I am drawing near the subject which 
I have undertaken to treat, though Athens is both in 
leagues and in centuries a great way off England after 
all. But first to recapitulate : — a State or polity im- 
plies two things, Power on the one hand, Liberty on 
the other ; a Rule and a Constitution. Power, when 
freely developed, results in centralization ; Liberty 
in self-government. The two principles are in antago- 
nism from their very nature ; so far forth as you have 
rule, you have not liberty ; so far forth as you have 
liberty, you have not rule. If a People gives up no- 
thing at all, it remains a mere People, and does not rise 
to be a State. If it gives up everything, it could not 
be worse off, though it gave up nothing. Accordingly, 
it always must give up something ; it never can give 
up everything ; and in every case the problem to be 
decided is, what is the most advisable compromise, 
what point is the maximum of at once protection and 
independence. 

Those political institutions are the best which sub- 
tract as little as possible from a people's natural inde- 
pendence as the price of their protection. The stronger 
you make the Ruler, the more he can do for you, but 
the more he also can do against you ; the weaker you 
make him, the less he can do against you, hut the less 
also he can do for you. The Man promised to kill the 
Stag; but he fairly owned that he must be first 
allowed to mount the Horse. Put a sword into the 



WHO'S TO BLAME f 63 

Ruler's hands, it is at his option to use or not use it 
against you ; reclaim it, and who is to use it for you ? 
Thus, if States are free, they are feeble ; if they are 
vigorous, they are high-handed. I am not speaking 
of a nation or a people, but of a State as such ; and 
I say, the more a State secures to itself of rule and cen- 
tralization, the more it can do for its subjects exter- 
nally ; and the more it grants to them of liberty and 
self-government, the less it can do against them inter- 
nally : and thus a despotic government is the best for 
war, and a popular government the best for peace. 

Now this may seem a paradox so far as this ; — that 
I have said a State cannot be at once free and strong, 
whereas the combination of these advantages is the 
very boast which we make about our own island in one 
of our national songs, which runs, — 

" Britannia, rule the waves ! 
Britons never shall be slaves" 

I acknowledge the force of this authority ; but I must 
recall the reader's attention to the distinction which I 
have just been making between a Nation and a State. 
Britons are free, considered as a State ; they are strong, 
considered as a Nation ; — and, as a good deal de- 
pends on this distinction, I will illustrate it, before 
I come to the consideration of our own country, by the 
instance of that ancient and famous people whose 
name I have prefixed to this portion of my inquiry, 
— a people who, in most respects, are as unlike us, 
as beauty is unlike utility, but who are in this respect, 
strange to say, not dissimilar to the Briton. 

So pure a democracy was Athens, that, if any of 
its citizens was eminent, he might be banished by the 



64 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

rest for this simple offence of greatness. Self-govern- 
ment was developed there in the fullest measure, as if 
provision was not at all needed against any foe. Nor 
indeed, in the earlier period of Athens, was it re- 
quired ; for the poverty of the soil, and the extent of 
seaboard as its boundary, secured it against both the 
cupidity and the successful enterprise of invaders. 
The chief object, then, of its polity was the main- 
tenance of internal order ; but even in this respect 
solicitude was superfluous, according to its citizens 
themselves, who were accustomed to boast that they 
were attracted, one and all, in one and the same way, 
and moulded into a body politic, by an innate percep- 
tion of the beautiful and true, and that the genius and 
cultivation of mind, which were their characteristics, 
served them better for the observance of the rules of 
good fellowship and for carrying on the intercourse 
of life, than the most stringent laws and the best 
appointed officers of police. 

Here then was the extreme of self-government carried 
out ; and the State was intensely free. That in propor- 
tion to that internal freedom was its weakness in its 
external relations, its uncertainty, caprice, injustice, and 
untrustworthiness, history, I think, abundantly shows. 
It may be thought unfair to appeal to the age of 
Philip and Demosthenes, when no Greek State could 
oppose a military organization worthy of such a foe as 
Macedon ; but at no anterior period had it shown a 
vigour and perseverance similar to the political force 
of the barbaric monarchy, which extinguished its liber- 
ties. It was simply unable to defend and perpetuate 
that democratical license which it so inordinately 
prized. 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 65 

Had Athens then no influence on the world outside 
of it, because its political influence was so baseless and 
fluctuating? Has she gained no conquests, exercised 
no rule, effected no changes, left no traces of herself 
upon the nations ? On the contrary, never was country- 
able to do so much ; never has country so impressed 
its image upon the history of the world, except always 
that similarly small strip of land in Syria. And more- 
over, — for this I wish to insist upon, rather than merely 
concede, — this influence of hers was in consequence, 
though not by means, of her democratical regime. That 
democratical polity formed a JPeople^ who could do what 
democracy itself could not do. Feeble all together, the 
Athenians were superlatively energetic one by one. It 
was their very keenness of intellect individually which 
made them collectively so inefficient. This point of 
character, insisted on both by friendly and hostile ora- 
tors in the pages of her great historian, is a feature in 
which Athens resembles England. Englishmen, indeed, 
do not go to work with the grace and poetry which, if 
Pericles is to be believed, characterized an Athenian ; 
but Athens may boast of her children as having the 
self-reliance, the spirit, and the unflagging industry of 
the individual Englishman. 

It was this individualism which was the secret of the 
power of Athens in hen day, and remains as the instru- 
ment of her influence now. What was her trade, or her 
colonies, or her literature, but private, not public achieve- 
ments, the triumph, not of State policy, but of personal 
effort? Rome sent out her colonies, as Russia now, 
with political foresight ; modern Europe has its State 
Universities, its Royal Academies, its periodical scientific 
Associations; it was otherwise with Athens. There, 



66 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

great things were done by citizens working in their pri- 
vate capacity ; working, it must be added, not so much 
from patriotism as for their personal advantage; or, if 
with patriotism, still with little chance of State encour- 
agement or reward. Socrates, the greatest of her mor- 
alists, and since his day one of her chief glories, lived 
unrecognized and unrewarded, and died under a judicial 
sentence. Xenophon conducted his memorable retreat 
across Asia Minor, not as an Athenian, but as the mer- 
cenary or volunteer of a Persian Prince. Miltiades was 
of a family of adventurers, who by their private energy 
had founded a colony, and secured a lordship in the 
Chersonese ; and he met his death while prosecuting his 
private interests with his country's vessels. Themisto- 
cles had a double drift, patriotic and traitorous, in the 
very acts by which he secured to the Greeks the victory 
of Salamis, having in mind that those acts should pro- 
fit him at the Persian court, if they did not turn to 
his account at home. Perhaps we are not so accurately 
informed of what took place at Rome, when Hannibal 
threatened the city ; but certainly Rome presents us 
with the picture of a strong State at that crisis, where- 
as, in the parallel trial, the Athens of Miltiades and 
Themistocles shows like the clever, dashing population 
of a large town. 

We have another sample ot the genius of her citi- 
zens in their conduct at Pylos. Neither they, nor their 
officers, would obey the orders of the elder Demos- 
thenes, who was sent out to direct the movements of 
the fleet. In vain did he urge them to fortify the place ; 
they did nothing ; tiU, the bad weather detaining them 
on shore, and inaction becoming tedious, suddenly they 
fell upon the work with a will ; and, having neither 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 67 

tools nor carriages, hunted up stones where they could 
find them ready in the soil, made clay do the office of 
mortar, carried the materials on their backs, supporting 
them with their clasped hands, and thus finished the 
necessary works in the course of a few days. 

By this personal enterprise and daring the Athenians 
were distinguished from the rest of Greece. '' They 
are fond of change," say their Corinthian opponents 
in the Lacedemonian Council ; " quick to plan and to 
perform, venturing beyond their power, hazarding be- 
yond their judgment, and always sanguine in what- 
ever difficulties. They are alive, while you, O Lace- 
demonians, dawdle ; and they love locomotion, while 
you are especially a home-people. They think to gain 
a point, even when they withdraw ; but with you, even 
to advance is to surrender what you have attained. 
When they defeat their foe they rush on ; when they 
are beaten, they hardly fall back. What they plan 
and do not follow up, they deem an actual loss ; what 
they set about and gain, they count a mere instalment 
of the future ; what they attempt and fail in here, in 
anticipation they make up for there. Such is their la- 
bour and their risk from youth to age ; no men enjoy so 
little what they have, for they are always getting, and 
their best holiday is to do a stroke of needful work ; 
and it is a misfortune to them to have to undergo, not 
the toil of business, but the listlessness of repose." 

I do not mean to say that I trace the Englishman 
in every clause of this passage ; but he is so far por- 
trayed in it as a whole, as to suggest to us that perhaps 
he too, as well as the Athenian, has that inward spring 
of restless independence, which makes a State weak, 
and a Nation great. 



68 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

PARALLEL CHARACTERISTICS OF ENGLISHMEN 

I hope I have now made it clear, that, in saying 
that a free State will not be strong, I am far indeed 
from saying that a People with what is called a free 
Constitution will not be active, powerful, influential, 
and successful. I am only saying that it will do its 
great deeds, not through the medium of its govern- 
ment, or politically^ but through the medium of its 
individual members, or nationally. Self-government, 
which is another name for political weakness, may 
really be the means or the token of national greatness. 
Athens, as a State, was wanting in the elements of 
integrity, firmness, and consistency ; but perhaps that 
political deficiency was the very condition and a result 
of her intellectual activity. 

I will allow more than this readily. Not only in 
cases such as that of Athens, is the State's loss the 
Nation's gain, but further, most of those very func- 
tions which in despotisms are undertaken by the State 
may be performed in free countries by the Nation. 
For instance, roads, the posts, railways, bridges, aque- 
ducts, and the like, in absolute monarchies, are govern- 
mental matters ; but they may be left to private energy, 
where self-government prevails. Letter-carriage in- 
deed involves an extent of system and a punctuality 
in work, which is too much for any combination of 
individuals ; but the care of Religion, which is a gov- 
ernmental work in Russia, and partly so in England, 
is left to private competition in the United States. 
Education, in like manner, is sometimes provided by 
the State, sometimes left to religious denominations, 
sometimes to private zeal and charity. The Fine 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 69 

Arts sometimes depend on the patronage of Court or 
Government ; sometimes are given in charge to Acade- 
mies; sometimes to committees or vestries. 

I do not say that a Nation will manage all these 
departments equally well, or so well as a despotic 
government ; and some departments it will not be able 
to manage at all. Did I think it could manage all, I 
should have nothing to write about. I am distinctly 
maintaining that the war department it cannot manage ; 
that is my very point. It cannot conduct a war ; but 
not from any fault in the nation, or with any resulting 
disparagement to popular governments and Constitu- 
tional States, but merely because we cannot have all 
things at once in this world, however big we are, and 
because, in the nature of things, one thing cannot be 
another. I do not say that a Constitutional State never 
must risk war, never must engage in war, never will 
conquer in war; but that its strong point lies in the 
other direction. If we would see what liberty, inde- 
pendence, self-government, a popular Constitution, can 
do, we must look to times of tranquillity. In peace 
a self-governing nation is prosperous in itself, and in- 
fluential in the wide world. Its special works, the 
sciences, the useful arts, literature, the interests of 
knowledge generally, material comfort, the means and 
appliances of a happy life, thrive especially in peace. 
And thus such a nation spreads abroad, and subdues 
the world, and reigns in the admiration and gratitude 
and deference of men, by the use of weapons which 
war shivers to pieces. Alas ! that mortals do not know 
themselves, and will not (according to the proverb) cut 
their coat according to their cloth ! *•' Optat ephippia 
hos^ John Bull, like other free, self-governing nations, 



70 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

would undertake a little war just now, as if it were 
his forte^ — as great lawyers have cared for nothing 
but a reputation for dancing gracefully, and literary 
men have bought a complex coat-of-arms at the 
Heralds' College. Why will we not be content to be 
human ? why not content with the well-grounded con- 
sciousness that no polity in the world is so wonderful, 
so good to its subjects, so favourable to individual 
energy, so pleasant to live under, as our own? I do 
not say, why will we go to war? but, why will we 
not think twice first? why do we not ascertain our 
actual position, our strength, our weakness, before we 
do so? 

For centuries upon centuries England has been, like 
Attica, a secluded land ; so remote from the highway of 
the world, so protected from the flood of Eastern and 
Northern barbarism, that her children have grown into 
a magnanimous contempt of external danger. They 
have had "a cheap defence" in the stormy sea which 
surrounds them ; and, from time immemorial, they have 
had such skill in weathering it, that their wooden walls, 
to use the Athenian term, became a second rampart 
against the foe, whom wind and water did not over- 
whelm. So secure have they felt in those defences, that 
they have habitually neglected others ; so that, in spite 
of their valour, when a foe once gained the shore, be he 
Dane, or Norman, or Dutch, he was encountered by no 
sustained action or organized resistance, and became 
their king. These, however, were rare occurrences, and 
made no lasting impression ; they were not sufficient to 
divert them from pursuing, or to thwart them in attain- 
ing, the amplest measures of liberty. Whom had the 
people to fear ? not even their ships, which could not, 



WHO'S TO BLAME f 71 

like military, become a paid force encircling a tyrant, 
and securing him against their resistance. 

To these outward circumstances of England, deter- 
mining the direction of its political growth, must be 
added the character of the people themselves. There are 
races to whom consanguinity itself is not concord and 
unanimity, but the reverse. They fight with each other, 
for lack of better company. Imaginative, fierce, vindic- 
tive, with their clans, their pedigrees, and their feuds, 
snorting war, spurning trade or tillage, the old High- 
landers, if placed on the broad plains of England, would 
have in time run through their national existence, and 
died the death of the sons of (Edipus. But, if you wish 
to see the sketch of a veritable Enghshman in strong 
relief, refresh your recollection of Walter Scott's "Two 
Drovers." He is indeed rough, surly, a bully and a 
bigot ; these are his weak points : but if ever there was 
a generous, good, tender heart, it beats within his breast. 
Most placable, he forgives and forgets : forgets, not 
only the wrongs he has received, but the insults he has 
inflicted. Such he is commonly; for doubtless there are 
times and circumstances in his dealings with foreigners 
in which, whether when in despair or from pride, he 
becomes truculent and simply hateful ; but at home his 
bark is worse than his bite. He has qualities, excel- 
lent for the purposes of neighbourhood and intercourse ; 
and he has, besides, a shrewd sense, and a sobriety of 
judgment, and a practical logic, which passion does not 
cloud, and which makes him understand that good- 
fellowship is not only commendable, but expedient too. 
And he has within him a spring of energy, pertinacity, 
and perseverance, which makes him as busy and effect- 
ive in a colony as he is companionable at home. Some 



72 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

races do not move at all; others are ever jostling 
against each other ; the Englishman is ever stirring, yet 
never treads too hard upon his fellow-countryman's toes. 
He does his work neatly, silently, in his own place ; he 
looks to himself, and can take care of himself ; and he 
has that instinctive veneration for the law, that he can 
worship it even in the abstract, and thus is fitted to 
go shares with others all around him in that political 
sovereignty, v\rhich other races are obliged to concen- 
trate in one ruler. 

There was a time when England was divided into 
seven principalities, formed out of the wild w^arriors 
whom the elder race had called in to their own exter- 
mination. What would have been the history of 
those kingdoms if the invaders had been Highlanders 
instead of Saxons? But the Saxon Heptarchy went 
on, without any very desperate wars of kingdom with 
kingdom, pretty much as the nation goes on now. In- 
deed, I much question, supposing Englishmen rose one 
morning and found themselves in a Heptarchy again, 
whether its seven portions would not jog on together, 
much as they do now under Queen Victoria, the union 
in both cases depending, not so much on the govern- 
ment and the governed, but on the people, viewed in 
themselves, to whom peaceableness, justice, and non- 
interference are natural. 

It is an invaluable national quality to be keen, yet to 
be fair to others ; to be inquisitive, acquisitive, enter- 
prising, aspiring, progressive, without encroaching 
upon his next neighbour's right to be the same. Such 
a people hardly need a Ruler, as being mainly free 
from the infirmities which make a ruler necessary. 
Law, like medicine, is only called for to assist nature ; 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 73 

and, when nature does so much for a people, the 
wisest policy is, as far as possible, to leave them to 
themselves. This, then, is the science of government 
with English Statesmen, to leave the people alone ; 
a free action, a clear stage, and they will do the rest 
for themselves. The more a Euler meddles, the less he 
succeeds ; the less he initiates, the more he accom- 
plishes ; his duty is that of overseeing, facilitating, en- 
couraging, guiding, interposing on emergencies. Some 
races are like children, and require a despot to nurse, 
and feed, and dress them, to give them pocket money, 
and take them out for airings. Others, more manly, 
prefer to be rid of the trouble of their affairs, and use 
their Euler as their mere manager and man of business. 
Now an Englishman likes to take his own matters into 
his own hands. He stands on his own ground, and does 
as much work as half a dozen men of certain other 
races. He can join too with others, and has a turn for 
organizing, but he insists on its being voluntary. He is 
jealous of no one, except kings and governments, and 
offensive to no one except their partisans and creatures. 
This, then, is the people for private enterprise ; and 
of private enterprise alone have I been speaking all 
along. What a place is London in its extent, its com- 
plexity, its myriads of dwellings, its subterraneous 
works ! It is the production, for the most part, of in- 
dividual enterprise. Waterloo Bridge was the greatest 
architectural achievement of the generation before 
this ; it was built by shares. New regions, with streets 
of palaces and shops innumerable, each shop a sort of 
shrine or temple of this or that trade, and each a treas- 
ure-house of its own merchandize, grow silently into 
existence, the creation of private spirit and speculation. 



74 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

The gigantic system of railroads rises and asks for its 
legal status : prudent statesmen decide that it must be 
left to private companies, to the exclusion of Govern- 
ment. Trade is to be encouraged ; the best encourage- 
ment is, that it should be free. A famine threatens ; 
one thing must be avoided, — any meddling on the part 
of Government with the export and import of pro- 
visions. 

Emigration is in vogue : out go swarms of colonists, 
not, as in ancient times, from the Prjrtaneum, under 
State guidance and with religious rites, but each by 
himself, and at his own arbitrary and sudden will. 
The ship is wrecked ; the passengers are cast upon 
a rock, — or make the hazard of a raft. In the ex- 
tremest peril, in the most delicate and most anxious 
of operations, every one seems to find his place, as if 
by magic, and does his work, and subserves the rest 
with coolness, cheerfulness, gentleness, and without 
a master. Or they have a fair passage, and gain their 
new country ; each takes his allotted place there, and 
works in it in his own way. Each acts irrespectively 
of the rest, takes care of number one, with a kind 
word and deed for his neighbour, but still as fully un- 
derstanding that he must depend for his own welfare 
on himself. Pass a few years, and a town has risen 
on the desert beach, and houses of business are ex- 
tending their connexions and influence up the coun- 
try. At length, a company of merchants make the 
place their homestead, and they protect themselves 
from their enemies with a fort. They need a better 
defence than they have provided, for a numerous host 
is advancing upon them, and they are likely to be 
driven into the sea. Suddenly a youth, the castaway 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 75 

of his family, half -clerk, half -soldier, puts himself at 
the head of a few troops, defends posts, gains battles, 
and ends in founding a mighty empire over the graves 
of Mahmood and Aurungzebe. 

It is the deed of one man ; and so, wherever we go 
all over the earth, it is the solitary Briton, the Lon- 
don agent, or the Milordos, who is walking restlessly 
about, abusing the natives, and raising a colossus, or 
setting the Thames on fire, in the East or the West. 
He is on the top of the Andes, or in a diving-bell in 
the Pacific, or taking notes at Timbuctoo, or grubbing 
at the Pyramids, or scouring over the Pampas, or act- 
ing as prime minister to the king of Dahomey, or 
smoking the pipe of friendship with the Red Indians, 
or hutting at the Pole. No one can say beforehand 
what will come of these various specimens of the inde- 
pendent, self-governing, self-reliant Englishman. Some- 
times failure, sometimes openings for trade, scientific 
discoveries, or political aggrandizements. His country 
and his government have the gain; but it is he who 
is the instrument of it, and not political organization, 
centralization, systematic plans, authoritative acts. 
The polity of England is what it was before, — the 
Government weak, the Nation strong, — strong in the 
strength of its multitudinous enterprise, which gives 
to its Government a position in the world, which that 
Government could not claim for itself by any prowess 
or device of its own. 

REVERSE OF THE PICTURE 

The social union promises two great and contrary 
advantages, Protection and Liberty, — such protection 
as shall not interfere with liberty, and such liberty as 



76 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

shall not interfere with protection. How much a given 
nation can secure of the one, and how much of the 
other, depends on its peculiar circumstances. As there 
are small frontier territories, which find it their inter- 
est to throw themselves into the hands of some great 
neighbour, sacrificing their liberties as the price of 
purchasing safety from barbarians or rivals, so too 
there are countries which, in the absence of external 
danger, have abandoned themselves to the secure 
indulgence of freedom, to the jealous exercise of self- 
government, and to the scientific formation of a Con- 
stitution. And as, when liberty has to be surrendered 
for protection, the Horse must not be surprised if the 
Man whips or spurs him, so, when protection is neg- 
lected for the sake of liberty, he must not be surprised 
if he suffers from the horns of the Stag. 

Protected by the sea, and gifted with a rare energy, 
self-possession, and imperturbability, the English peo- 
ple have been able to carry out self-government to its 
limits, and to absorb into its constitutional action many 
of those functions which are necessary for the protec- 
tion of any country, and commonly belong to the Ex- 
ecutive; and triumphing in their marvellous success 
they have thought no task too hard for them, and have 
from time to time attempted more than even England 
could accomplish. Such a crisis has come upon us now, 
and the Constitution has not been equal to the occa- 
sion. For a year past we have been conducting a great 
war on our Constitutional routine^ and have not suc- 
ceeded in it. If we continue that routine^ we shall 
have more failures, with France or Russia (whichever 
you please) to profit by it: — if we change it, we 
change what after all is Constitutional. It is this di- 



WHO^S TO BLAME? 77 

lemma which makes me wish for peace, — or else some 
Deus ex machina^ some one greater even than Wel- 
lington, to carry us through. We cannot depend upon 
Constitutional routine. 

People abuse routine^ and say that all the mischief 
which happens is the fault of routine ; — but can they 
get out of routine^ without getting out of the Consti- 
tution ? That is the question. The fault of a routine 
Executive, I suppose, is not that the Executive always 
goes on in one way, — else, system is in fault, — but 
that it goes on in a bad way, or on a bad system. We 
must either change the system, then, — our Constitu- 
tional system ; or not find fault with its routine^ which 
is according to it. The present Parliamentary Com- 
mittee of Inquiry, for instance, is either a function and 
instrument of the routine system, — and therefore is 
making bad worse, — or is not, — and then perhaps it 
is only the beginning of an infringement of the Con- 
stitution. There may be Constitutional failures which 
have no Constitutional remedies, unwilling as we may 
be to allow it. They may be necessarily incidental to 
a free self-governing people. 

The Executive of a nation is the same all over the 
world, being, in other words, the administration of 
the nation's affairs ; it differs in different countries, not 
in its nature and office, nor in its end, acts, or func- 
tions, but in its characteristics, as being prompt, direct, 
effective, or the contrary ; that is, as being strong or 
feeble. If it pursues its ends earnestly, performs its 
acts vigorously aud discharges its functions successfully, 
then it is a strong Executive ; if otherwise, it is feeble. 
Now, it is obvious, the more it is concentrated, that is, 
the fewer are its springs, and the simpler its mechan- 



78 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

ism, the stronger it is, because it has least friction and 
loss of power ; on the other hand, the more numerous 
and widely dispersed its centres of action are, and the 
more complex and circuitous their inter-action, the more 
feeble it is. It is strongest, then, when it is lodged 
in one man out of the whole nation; it is feeblest, 
when it is lodged, by participation or conjointly, 
in every man in it. How can we help what is self- 
evident? If the English people lodge power in the 
many, not in the few, what wonder that its operation 
is roundabout, clumsy, slow, intermittent, and disap- 
pointing? And what is the good of finding fault with 
the routine^ if it is after all the principle of the routine^ 
or the system, or the Constitution, which causes the 
hitch ? You cannot eat your cake and have it ; you 
cannot be at once a self-governing nation and have a 
strong government. Recollect Wellington's question 
in opposition to the Reform Bill, " How is the King's 
Government to be carried on ? " We are beginning to 
experience its full meaning. 

A people so alive, so curious, so busy as the English, 
will be a power in themselves, independently of polit- 
ical arrangements ; and will be on that very ground 
jealous of a rival, impatient of a master, and strong 
enough to cope with the one and to withstand the other. 
A government is their natural foe ; they cannot do 
without it altogether, but they will have of it as little 
as they can. They will forbid the concentration of 
power ; they will multiply its seats, complicate its acts, 
and make it safe by making it inefficient. They will 
take care that it is the worst-worked of all the many 
organizations which are found in their country. As 
despotisms keep their subjects in ignorance, lest they 



WHO'S TO BLAME? 79 

should rebel, so wiU a free people maim and cripple 
their government, lest it should tyrannize. 

This is human nature ; the more powerful a man is, 
the more jealous is he of other powers. Little men 
endure little men ; but great men aim at a solitary 
grandeur. The English nation is intensely conscious of 
itself ; it has seen, inspected, recognized, appreciated, 
and warranted itself. It has erected itself into a per- 
sonality, under the style and title of John Bull. Most 
neighbourly is he when let alone ; but irritable, when 
commanded or coerced. He wishes to form his own 
judgment in all matters, and to have everything proved 
to him ; he dislikes the thought of generously placing 
his interests in the hands of others, he grudges to give 
up what he cannot really keep himself, and stickles 
for being at least a sleeping partner in transactions 
which are beyond him. He pays his people for their 
work, and is as proud of them, if they do it well, as 
a rich man of his tall footmen. 

Policy might teach him a different course. If you 
want your work done well, which you cannot do your- 
self, find the best man, put it Into his hand, and trust 
him implicitly. An Englishman is too sensible not to 
understand this in private matters ; but in matters of 
State he is afraid of such a policy. He prefers the 
system of checks and counter-checks, the division of 
power, the imperative concurrence of disconnected offi- 
cials, and his own supervision and revision, — the method 
of hitches, cross-purposes, collisions, deadlocks, to the 
experiment of treating his public servants as gentlemen. 
I am not quarrelling with what is inevitable in his 
system of seLt'-government ; I only say that he cannot 
expect his w^ork done in the best style, if this is his mode 



80 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

of providing for it. Duplicate functionaries do but 
merge responsibility ; and a jealous master is paid with 
formal, heartless service. Do your footmen love you 
across the gulf which you have fixed between them and 
you ? and can you expect your store-keepers and har- 
bour-masters at Balaklava not to serve you by rule and 
precedent, not to be rigid in their interpretation o£ 
your orders, and to commit themselves as little as they 
can, when you show no belief in their zeal, and have no 
mercy on their failures? 

England, surely, is the paradise of little men, and 
the purgatory of great ones. May I never be a Min- 
ister of State or a Field-Marshal ! I 'd be an individ- 
ual, self-respecting Briton, in my own private castle, 
with the Times to see the world by, and pen and paper 
to scribble off withal to some public print, and set 
the world right. Public men are only my employes ; 
I use them as I think fit, and turn them off without 
warning. Aberdeen, Gladstone, Sidney Herbert, New- 
castle, what are they muttering about services and 
ingratitude ? were they not paid ? had n't they their 
regular quarter-day ? Kaglan, Burgoyne, Dundas, — 
I cannot recollect all the fellows' names, — can they 
merit aught ? can they be profitable to me their lord 
and master ? And so, having no tenderness or respect 
for their persons, their antecedents, or their age, — not 
caring that in fact they are serving me with all their 
strength, not asking whether, if they manage ill, it be 
not, perchance, because they are in the fetters of Con- 
stitutional red tape, which have weighed on their hearts 
and deadened their energies, till the hazard of failure 
and the fear of censure have quenched the spirit of 
daring, I think it becoming and generous, — during, not 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE ' 81 

after their work, not when it is ended, but in the very- 
agony of conflict, — to institute a formal process of 
inquiry into their demerits, not secret, not indulgent to 
their sense of honour, but in the hearing of all Europe, 
and amid the scorn of the world, —- hitting down, knock- 
ing over, my workhouse apprentices, in order that they 
may get up again, and do my matters for me better. 

How far these ways of managing a crisis can be 
amended in a self-governing Nation, it is most difficult 
to say. They are doubly deplorable, as being both 
unjust and impolitic. They are kind, neither to our- 
selves, nor to our public servants ; and they so un- 
pleasantly remind one of certain passages of Athenian 
history, as to suggest that perhaps they must ever 
more or less exist, except where a despotism, by simply 
extinguishing liberty, effectually prevents its abuse. 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 

But one attribute the Church has, and the Pope as 
head of the Church, whether he be in high estate, as 
this world goes, or not, whether he has temporal pos- 
sessions or not, whether he is in honour or dishonour, 
whether he is at home or driven about, whether those 
special claims of which I have spoken are allowed or 
not, — and that is Sovereignty. As God has sove- 
reignty, though He may be disobeyed or disowned, so 
has His Vicar upon earth; and further than this, since 
Catholic populations are found everywhere, he ever 
will be in fact lord of a vast empire ; as large in num- 
bers, as far spreading as the British ; and all his acts 



82 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

are sure to be such as are in keeping with the position 
of one who is thus supremely exalted. 

I beg not to be interrupted here, as many a reader 
will interrupt me in his thoughts ; for I am using these 
words, not at random, but as the commencement of 
a long explanation, and, in a certain sense, limitation, 
of what I have hitherto been saying concerning the 
Church's and the Pope's power. To this task the re- 
maining pages, which I have to address to your Grace, 
will be directed; and I trust that it will turn out, when 
I come to the end of them, that, by first stating fully 
what the Pope's claims are, I shall be able most clearly 
to show what he does not claim. 

Now the key-note of Mr. Gladstone's Pamphlet is 
this: — that, since the Pope claims infallibility in faith 
and morals, and since there are no " departments and 
functions of human life which do not and cannot fall 
within the domain of morals," p. 36, and since he 
claims also " the domain of all that concerns the 
government and discipline of the Church," and more- 
over, '' claims the power of determining the limits of 
those domains," and " does not sever them, by any 
acknowledged or intelligible line from the domains of 
civil duty and allegiance," p. 45, therefore Catholics 
are moral and mental slaves, and " every convert and 
member of the Pope's Church places his loyalty and 
civil duty at the mercy of another," p. 45. 

I admit Mr. Gladstone's premisses, but I reject his 
conclusion ; and now I am going to show why I reject it. 

In doing this, I shall, with him, put aside for the 
present the Pope's prerogative of infallibility in gen- 
eral enunciations, whether of faith or morals, and con- 
fine myself to the consideration of his authority (in 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 83 

respect to which he is not infallible) in matters of 
daily conduct, and of our duty of obedience to him. 
" There is something wider still," he says, (than the 
claim of infallibility,) "and that is the claim to an 
Absolute and entire Obedience," p. 37. " Little does 
it matter to me, whether my Superior claims infal- 
libility, so long as he is entitled to demand and exact 
conformity," p. 39. He speaks of a third province 
being opened, " not indeed to the abstract assertion 
of Infallibility, but to the far more practical and de- 
cisive demand of Absolute Obedience," p. 41, " the 
Absolute Obedience, at the peril of salvation, of every 
member of his communion," p. 42. 

Now, I proceed to examine this large, direct, relig- 
ious sovereignty of the Pope, both in its relation to 
his subjects, and to the Civil Power ; but first, I beg 
to be allowed to say just one word on the principle of 
obedience itself, that is, by way of inquiry, whether it 
is or is not now a religious duty. 

Is there then such a duty at all as obedience to ec- 
clesiastical authority now? or is it one of those obsolete 
ideas, which are swept away, as unsightly cobwebs, by 
the New Civilization ? Scripture says, " Remember 
them which have the ride over you, who have spoken 
unto you the word of God, whose faith follow." And, 
" Obey them that have the ride over you, and submit 
yourselves ; for they watch for your souls, as they 
that must give account, that they may do it with joy 
and not with grief ; for that is unprofitable for you." 
The margin in the Protestant Version reads, " those 
who are your guides ;^^ and the word may also be trans- 
lated "leaders." Well, as rulers, or guides and leaders, 
whichever word be right, they are to be obeyed. Now 



84 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Mr. Gladstone dislikes our way of fulfilling this pre- 
cept, whether as regards our choice of ruler and leader, 
or our "Absolute Obedience " to him ; but he does not 
give us his own. Is there any liberalistic reading of 
the Scripture passage ? Or are the words only for the 
benefit of the poor and ignorant, not for the Schola 
(as it may be called) of political and periodical writers, 
not for individual members of Parliament, not for 
statesmen and Cabinet ministers, and people of Pro- 
gress ? Which party then is the more " Scriptural," 
those who recognize and carry out in their conduct 
texts like these, or those who don't ? May not we Cath- 
olics claim some mercy from Mr. Gladstone, though we 
be faulty in the object and the manner of our obedience, 
since in a lawless day an object and a manner of obedi- 
ence we have ? Can we be blamed, if, arguing from 
those texts which say that ecclesiastical authority comes 
from above, we obey it in that one form in which alone 
we find it on earth, in that only person who claims it 
of us, among all the notabilities of this nineteenth cen- 
tury into which we have been born ? The Pope has no 
rival in his claim upon us ; nor is it our doing that his 
claim has been made and allowed for centuries upon 
centuries, and that it was he who made the Vatican 
decrees, aijd not they him. If we give him up, to whom 
shall we go ? Can we dress up any civil functionary in 
the vestments of divine authority ? Can I, for instance, 
follow the faith, can I put my soul into the hands, of 
our gracious Sovereign ? or of the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury ? or of the Bishop of Lincoln, albeit he is not 
broad and low, but high ? Catholics have " done what 
they could," — all that any one could : and it should 
be Mr. Gladstone's business, before telling us that we 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 85 

are slaves, because we obey the Pope, first of all to 
tear away those texts from the Bible. 

With this preliminary remark, I proceed to consider 
w^hether the Pope's authority is either a slavery to his 
subjects, or a menace to the Civil Power ; and first, as 
to his power over his flock. 

1. Mr. Gladstone says that "the Pontiff declares 
to belong to him the supreme direction of Catholics in 
respect to all duty," p. 37. Supreme direction ; true, 
but "supreme" is not "minute," nor does "direction" 
mean supervision or "management." Take the parallel 
of human law ; the Law is supreme^ and the Law 
directs our conduct under the manifold circumstances 
in which we have to act, and must be absolutely obeyed ; 
but who therefore says that the Law has the " supreme 
direction" of us? The State, as well as the Church, 
has the power at its will of imposing laws upon us, 
laws bearing on our moral duties, our daily conduct, 
affecting our actions in various ways, and circumscrib- 
ing our liberties ; yet no one would say that the Law, 
after all, with all its power in the abstract and its 
executive vigour in fact, interferes either with our com- 
fort or our conscience. There are numberless laws 
about property, landed and personal, titles, tenures, 
trusts, wills, covenants, contracts, partnerships, money 
transactions, life-insurances, taxes, trade, navigation, 
education, sanitary measures, trespasses, nuisances, all 
in addition to the criminal law. Law, to apply Mr. 
Gladstone's words, " is the shadow that cleaves to us, 
go where we will." Moreover, it varies year after year, 
and refuses to give any pledge of fixedness or final- 
ity. Nor can any one tell what restraint is to come 
next, perhaps painful personally to himself. Nor are 



86 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

its enactments easy of interpretation ; for actual cases, 
with the speeches and opinions of counsel, and the de- 
cisions of judges, must prepare the raw material, as it 
proceeds from the Legislature, before it can be rightly- 
understood ; so that " the glorious uncertainty of the 
Law " has become a proverb. And, after all, no one 
is sure of escaping its penalties without the assistance 
of lawyers, and that in such private and personal mat- 
ters that the lawyers are, as by an imperative duty, 
bound to a secrecy which even courts of justice respect. 
And then, besides the Statute Law, there is the com- 
mon and traditional ; and, below this, usage. Is not 
all this enough to try the temper of a free-born English- 
man, and to make him cry out with Mr. Gladstone, 
" Three fourths of my life are handed over to the Law ; 
I care not to ask if there be dregs or tatters of human 
life, such as can escape from the description and bound- 
ary of Parliamentary tyranny " ? Yet, though we may 
dislike it, though we may at times suffer from it ever 
so much, who does not see that the thraldom and irk- 
someness are nothing compared with the great bless- 
ings which the Constitution and Legislature secure 
tons? 

Such is the jurisdiction which the Law exercises over 
us. What rule does the Pope claim which can be com- 
pared to its strong and its long arm ? What interfer- 
ence with our liberty of judging and acting in our daily 
work, in our course of life, comes to us from him? 
Really, at first sight, I have not known whereto look 
for instances of his actual interposition in our private 
affairs, for it is our routine of personal duties about 
which I am now speaking. Let us see how we stand 
in this matter. 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 87 

We are giiided in our ordinary duties by the books 
of moral theology, which are drawn up by theologians 
of authority and experience, as an instruction for our 
Confessors. These books are based on the three Chris- 
tian foundations of Faith, Hope, and Charity, on the 
Ten Commandments, and on the six Precepts of the 
Church, which relate to the observance of Sunday, of 
fast days, of confession and communion, and, in one 
shape or other, to paying tithes. A great number of 
possible cases are noted under these heads, and in diffi- 
cult questions a variety of opinions are given, with 
plain directions, when it is that private Catholics are 
at liberty to choose for themselves whatever answer they 
like best, and when they are bound to follow some one 
of them in particular. Reducible as these directions in 
detail are to the few and simple heads which I have 
mentioned, they are little more than reflexions and 
memoranda of our moral sense, unlike the positive 
enactments of the Legislature ; and, on the whole, pre- 
sent to us no difficulty — though now and then some 
critical question may arise, and some answer may be 
given (just as by the private conscience) which it is 
difficult to us or painful to accept. And again, cases 
may occur now and then, when our private judgment 
differs from what is set down in theological works, but 
even then it does not follow at once that our private 
judgment must give way, for those books are no utter- 
ance of Papal authority. 

And this is the point to which I am coming. So 
little does the Pope come into this whole system of 
moral theology by which (as by our conscience) our 
lives are regulated, that the weight of his hand upon 
us, as private men, is absolutely unappreciable. I have 



88 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

had a difficulty where to find a measure or gauge of 
his interposition. At length I have looked through 
Busenbaum's Medulla^ to ascertain what light such 
a book would throw upon the question. It is a book 
of casuistry for the use of Confessors, running to 700 
pages, and is a large repository of answers made by 
various theologians on points of conscience, and gen- 
erally of duty. It was first published in 1645 — my 
own edition is of 1844 — and in the latter are marked 
those propositions, bearing on subjects treated in it, 
which have been condemned by Popes in the interme- 
diate 200 years. On turning over the pages I find 
they are in all between 50 and 60. This list includes 
matters sacramental, ritual, ecclesiastical, monastic, 
and disciplinarian, as well as moral, — relating to the 
duties of ecclesiastics and regulars, of parish priests, 
and of professional men, as well as of private Catho- 
lics. And the condemnations relate for the most part 
to mere occasional details of duty, and are in reproba- 
tion of the lax or wild notions of speculative casuists, 
so that they are rather restraints upon theologians 
than upon laymen. For instance, the following are 
some of the propositions condemned : " The ecclesi- 
astic, who on a certain day is hindered from saying 
Matins and Lauds, is not bound to say, if he can, the 
remaining hours," "Where there is good cause, it 
is lawful to swear without the purpose of swearing, 
whether the matter is of light or grave moment ; " 
"- Domestics may steal from their masters, in compen- 
sation for their service, which they think greater than 
their wages ; '' " It is lawful for a public man to kill 
an opponent, who tries to fasten a calumny upon him, 
if he cannot otherwise escape the ignominy." I have 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 89 

taken these instances at random. It must be granted, 
I think, that in the long course of 200 years the 
amount of the Pope's authoritative enunciations has 
not been such as to press heavily on the back of the 
private Catholic. He leaves us surely far more than 
that " one fourth of the department of conduct," which 
Mr. Gladstone allov^s us. Indeed, if my account and 
specimens of his sway over us in morals be correct, I 
do not see what he takes away at all from our private 
consciences. 

Mr. Gladstone says that the Pope virtually claims 
to himself the wide domain of conduct, and therefore 
that we are his slaves : — let us see if another illustra- 
tion or parallel will not show this to be a non-sequitur. 
Suppose a man, who is in the midst of various and 
important lines of business, has a medical adviser, in 
whom he has full confidence, as knowing well his con- 
stitution. This adviser keeps a careful and anxious 
eye upon him ; and, as an honest man, says to him, 
" You must not go off oii a journey to-day," or '^ you 
must take some days' rest," or " you must attend to 
your diet." Now, this is not a fair parallel to the Pope's 
hold upon us ; for he does not speak to us personally 
but to all, and in speaking definitely on ethical sub- 
jects, what he propounds must relate to things good 
and bad in themselves, not to things accidental, change- 
able, and of mere expedience ; so that the argument 
which I am drawing from the case of a medical ad- 
viser is a fortiori in its character. However, I say 
that, though a medical man exercises a " supreme 
direction " of those who put themselves under him, 
yet we do not therefore say, even of him, that he 
interferes with our daily conduct, and that we are his 



90 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

slaves. He certainly does thwart many of our wishes 
and purposes ; in a true sense we are at his mercy ; 
he may interfere any day, suddenly ; he will not, he 
cannot, draw any line between his action and our 
action. The same journey, the same press of busi- 
ness, the same indulgence at table, which he passes 
over one year, he sternly forbids the next. If Mr. 
Gladstone's argument is good, he has a finger in all 
the commercial transactions of the great merchant or 
financier w^ho has chosen him. But surely there is a 
simple fallacy here. Mr. Gladstone asks us whether 
our political and civil life is not at the Pope's mercy ; 
every act, he says, of at least three quarters of the 
day, is under his control. No, not every^ but any^ and 
this is all the difference — that is, we have no guaran- 
tee given us that there will never be a case, when the 
Pope's general utterances may come to have a bearing 
upon some personal act of ours. In the same way we 
are all of us in this age under the control of public 
opinion and the public prints ; nay, much more inti- 
mately so. Journalism can be and is very personal ; 
and, when it is in the right, more powerful just now 
than any Pope ; yet we do not go into fits, as if we 
were slaves, because we are under a sitrveillance much 
more like tyranny than any sway, so indirect, so prac- 
tically limited, so gentle, as his is. 

But it seems the cardinal point of our slavery lies, 
not simply in the domain of morals, but in the Pope's 
general authority over us in all things whatsoever. 
This count in his indictment Mr. Gladstone founds on 
a passage in the third chapter of the Pastor aeternus^ 
in which the Pope, speaking of the Pontifical juris- 
diction, says ; " Towards it (erga quam) pastors and 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 91 

people of whatsoever rite or dignity, each and all, are 
bound by the duty of "hierarchical subordination and 
true obedience, not only in matters which pertain to 
faith and morals, but also in those which pertain to 
the discipline and the regimen of the Church spread 
throughout the world ; so that, unity with the Roman 
Pontiff (both of communion and of profession of the 
same faith) being preserved, the Church of Christ 
may be one flock under one supreme Shepherd. This 
is the doctrine of Catholic truth, from which no one 
can deviate without loss of faith and salvation," 

On Mr. Gladstone's use of this passage I observe 
first, that he leaves out a portion of it which has much 
to do with the due understanding of it (ita ut custodita, 
etc.) Next, he speaks of '^absohite obedience" so often, 
that any reader, who had not the passage before him, 
would think that the word " absolute " was the Pope's 
word, not his. Thirdly, three times (at pp. 38, 41, and 
42) does he make the Pope say that no one can disobey 
him without risking his salvation, whereas what the 
Pope does say is, that no one can dishelieve the duty of 
obedience and unity without such risk. And fourthly, 
in order to carry out this false sense, or rather to hin- 
der its being evidently impossible, he mistranslates, 
p. 38, "doctrina" (Haec est doctrina) by the word 
''rule." 

But his chief attack is directed to the words " dis- 
ciplina " and "regimen." ''Thus," he says, "are swept 
into the Papal net whole multitudes of facts, whole 
systems of government, prevailing, though in different 
degrees, in every country of the world," p. 41. That 
is, disciplina and regimen are words of such lax, vague, 
indeterminate meaning, that under them any matters 



92 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

can be slipped in which may be required for the Pope's 
purpose in this or that country, such as, to take Mr. 
Gladstone's instances, blasphemy, poor-relief, incor- 
poration and mortmain ; as if no definitions were con- 
tained in our theological and ecclesiastical works of 
words in such common use, and as if in consequence 
the Pope was at liberty to give them any sense of his 
own. As to discipline, Fr. Perrone says, " Discipline 
comprises the exterior worship of God, the liturgy, 
sacred rites, psalmody, the administration of the sacra- 
ments, the canonical form of sacred elections and the 
institution of ministers, vows, feast-days, and the like;" 
all of them (observe) matters internal to the Church, 
and without any relation to the Civil Power and civil 
affairs. Perrone adds, '' Ecclesiastical discipline is a 
practical and external rule, prescribed by the Church, 
in order to retain the faithful in their faith^ and the 
more easily lead them on to eternal happiness ^^"^ PraeL 
Tlieol. t. 2, p. 381, 2d ed., 1841. Thus discipline is in 
no sense a political instrument, except as the profession 
of our faith may accidentally become political. In the 
same sense Zallinger : " The Roman Pontiff has by 
divine right the power of passing universal laws per- 
taining to the discipline of the Church ; for instance, 
to divine worship, sacred rites, the ordination and man- 
ner of life of the clergy, the order of the ecclesiastical 
regimen, and the right administration of the temporal 
possessions of the Church." — Jiir, Eeeles,^ lib. i, t. 2, 
§ 121. 

So too the word " regimen " has a definite meaning, 
relating to a matter strictly internal to the Church ; 
it means government, or the mode or form of govern- 
ment, or the course of government, and, as, in the in- 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 93 

tercourse of nation with nation, the nature of a nation's 
government, whether monarchical or republican, does 
not come into question, so the constitution of the 
Church simply belongs to its nature, not to its exter- 
nal action. There are indeed aspects of the Church 
which involve relations toward secular powers and to 
nations, as, for instance, its missionary office ; but regi- 
men has relation to one of its internal characteristics, 
viz., its form of government, whether we call it a pure 
monarchy or with others a monarchy tempered by aris- 
tocracy. Thus Tournely says, " Three kinds of regimen 
or government are set down by philosophers, monarchy, 
aristocracy, and democracy," TheoL^ t. 2, p. 100. 
Bellarmine says the same, Horn, Pont, i, 2 ; and Per- 
rone takes it for granted, ihid. pp. 70, 71. 

Now, why does the Pope speak at this time of regi- 
men and discipline? He tells us, in that portion of 
the sentence, which, thinking it of no account, Mr. 
Gladstone has omitted. The Pope tells us that all 
Catholics should recollect their duty of obedience to 
him, not only in faith and morals, but in such matters 
of regimen and discipline as belong to the universal 
Church, '' so that unity with the Roman Pontiff, both 
of communion and of profession of the same faith be- 
ing preserved, the Church of Christ may be one flock 
under one supreme Shepherd." I consider this passage 
to be especially aimed at Nationalism: ''Recollect," 
the Pope seems to say, " the Church is one, and that, 
not only in faith and morals, for schismatics may pro- 
fess as much as this, but one, wherever it is, all over 
the world ; and not only one, but one and the same, 
bound together by its one regimen and discipline, and 
by the same regimen and discipline, — the same rites, 



94 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the same sacraments, the same usages, and the same 
one Pastor ; and in these bad times it is necessary for 
all Catholics to recollect, that this doctrine of the 
Church's individuality and, as it were, personality, is 
not a mere received opinion or understanding, which 
may be entertained or not, as we please, but is a fun- 
damental, necessary truth." This being, speaking 
under correction, the drift of the passage, I observe 
that the words " spread throughout the world " or 
" universal " are so far from turning " discipline and 
regimen" into what Mr. Gladstone calls a ''net," that 
they contract the range of both of them, not including, 
as he would have it, '' marriage " here, " blasphemy " 
there, and " poor-relief " in a third country, but noting 
and specifying that one and the same structure of laws, 
rites, rules of government, independency, everywhere, 
of which the Pope himself is the centre and life. And 
surely this is what every one of us wiU say with the Pope, 
who is not an Erastian, and who believes that the 
Gospel is no mere philosophy thrown upon the world 
at large, no mere quality of mind and thought, no mere 
beautiful and deep sentiment or subjective opinion, but 
a substantive message from above, guarded and pre- 
served in a visible polity. 

2. And now I am naturally led on to speak of the 
Pope's supreme authority, such as I have described it, in 
its bearing towards the Civil Power all over the world, 
— various, as the Church is invariable, — a power 
which as truly comes from God, as his own does. 

That collisions can take place between the Holy See 
and national governments the history of fifteen hun- 
dred years teaches us ; also, that on both sides there 
may occur grievous mistakes. But my question all 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 95 

along lies, not with "quicquid delirant reges," but with 
what, under the circumstance of such a collision, is 
the duty of those who are both children of the Pope 
and subjects of the Civil Power. As to the duty of 
the Civil Power, I have already intimated in my first 
section, that it should treat the Holy See as an inde- 
pendent sovereign, and if this rule had been observed, 
the difficulty to Catholics in a country not Catholic, 
would be most materially lightened. Great Britain 
recognizes and is recognized by the United States ; the 
two powers have ministers at each other's courts ; here 
is one standing prevention of serious quarrels. Misun- 
derstandings between the two co-ordinate powers may 
arise ; but there follow explanations, removals of the 
causes of offence, acts of restitution. In actual colli- 
sions, there are conferences, compromises, arbitrations. 
Now the point to observe here is, that in such cases 
neither party gives up its abstract rights, but neither 
party practically insists on them. And each party 
thinks itself in the right in the particular case, protests 
against any other view, but still concedes. Neither party 
says, " I will not make it up with you, till you draw 
an intelligible line between your domain and mine." I 
suppose in the Geneva arbitration, though we gave 
way,- we still thought that, in our conduct in the Amer- 
ican civil war, we had acted within our rights. I say 
all this in answer to Mr. Gladstone's challenge to us 
to draw the line between the Pope's domain and the 
State's domain in civil or political questions. Many 
a private American, I suppose, lived in London and 
Liverpool, all through the correspondence between our 
Foreign Office and the government of the United 
States, and Mr. Gladstone never addressed any expos- 



96 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

tulation to them, or told them they had lost their moral 
freedom because they took part with their own govern- 
ment. The French, when their late war began, did 
sweep their German sojourners out of France, (the 
number, as I recollect, was very great,) but they were 
not considered to have done themselves much credit by 
such an act. When we went to war with Russia, the 
English in St. Petersburg made an address, I think to 
the Emperor, asking for his protection, and he gave it ; 
— I don't suppose they pledged themselves to the 
Russian view of the war, nor would he have called them 
slaves instead of patriots, if they had refused to do so. 
Suppose England were to send her Ironclads to sup- 
port Italy against the Pope and his allies, English 
Catholics would be very indignant, they would take 
part with the Pope before the war began, they would use 
all constitutional means to hinder it ; but who believes 
that, when they were once in the war, their action 
would be anything else than prayers and exertions for 
a termination of it ? What reason is there for saying 
that they would commit themselves to any step of 
a treasonable nature, any more than loyal Germans, had 
they been allowed to remain in France ? Yet, because 
those Germans would not relinquish their allegiance 
to their country, Mr. Gladstone, were he consistent, 
would at once send them adrift. 

Of course it will be said that in these cases, there 
is no double allegiance, and again that the German 
government did not call upon them, as the Pope might 
call upon English Catholics, nay, command them, to 
take a side ; but my argument at least shows this, 
that till there comes to us a special, direct command 
from the Pope to oppose our country, we need not be 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 97 

said to have " placed our loyalty and civil duty at the 
mercy of another," p. 45. It is strange that a great 
statesman, versed in the new and true philosophy of 
compromise, instead of taking a practical view of the 
actual situation, should proceed against us, like a Pro- 
fessor in the schools, with the " parade " of his '^ re- 
lentless " (and may I add " rusty " ? ) " logic," p. 23. 

I say, till the Pope told us to exert ourselves for 
his cause in a quarrel with this country, as in the time 
of the Armada, we need not attend to an abstract and 
hypothetical difficulty : — then and not till then. I 
add, as before, that if the Holy See were frankly re- 
cognized by England, as other Sovereign Powers are, 
direct quarrels between the two powers would in this 
age of the world be rare indeed ; and still rarer, their 
becoming so energetic and urgent as to descend into 
the heart of the community, and to disturb the con- 
sciences and the family unity of private Catholics. 

But now, lastly, let us suppose one of these extra- 
ordinary cases of direct and open hostility between 
the two powers actually to occur ; — here first, we 
must bring before us the state of the case. Of course, 
we must recollect, on the one hand, that Catholics are 
not only bound to allegiance to the British Crown, but 
have special privileges as citizens, can meet together, 
speak and pass resolutions, can vote for members of 
Parliament, and sit in Parliament, and can hold office, 
all which are denied to foreigners sojourning among 
us ; while on the other hand there is the authority of 
the Pope, which, though not " absolute " even in relig- 
ious matters, as Mr. Gladstone would have it to be, 
has a call, a supreme call on our obedience. Certainly 
in the event of such a collision of jurisdictions, there 



98 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

are cases in which we should obey the Pope and dis- 
obey the State. Suppose, for instance, an Act was 
passed in Parliament, bidding Catholics to attend Pro- 
testant service every week, and the Pope distinctly 
told us not to do so, for it was to violate our duty to 
our faith : — I should obey the Pope and not the Law. 
It will be said by Mr. Gladstone, that such a case is 
impossible. I know it i^g^^Hbiit why ask me for what 
I should do in extreme and utterly improbable cases 
such as this, if my answer cannot help bearing the 
character of an axiom ? It is not my fault that I must 
deal in truisms. The circumferences of State juris- 
diction and of Papal are for the most part quite apart 
from each other ; there are just some few degrees out 
of the 360 in which they intersect, and Mr. Gladstone, 
instead of letting these cases of intersection alone, 
till they occur actually, asks me what I should do, if 
I found myself placed in the space intersected. If I 
must answer then, I should say distinctly that did the 
State tell me in a question of worship to do what the 
Pope told me not to do, I should obey the Pope, and 
should think it no sin, if I used all the power and the 
influence I possessed as a citizen to prevent such a 
Bill passing the Legislature, and to effect its repeal 
if it did. 

But now, on the other hand, could the case ever 
occur, in which I should act with the Civil Power, and 
not with the Pope ? Now, here again, when I begin 
to imagine instances. Catholics will cry out, (as Mr. 
Gladstone, in the case I supposed, cried out in the 
interest of the other side,) that instances never can 
occur. I know they cannot ; I know the Pope never 
can do what I am going to suppose ; but then, since 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 99 

it cannot possibly happen in fact, there is no harm in 
just saying what I should (hypothetically) do, if it 
did happen. I say then in certain (impossible) cases 
I should side, not with the Pope, but with the Civil 
Power. For instance, I believe members of Parlia- 
ment, or of the Privy Council, take an oath that they 
would not acknowledge the right of succession of a 
Prince of Wales, if he became a Catholic. I should 
not consider the Pope could release me from that oath 
had I bound myself by it. Of course, I might exert 
myself to the utmost to get the Act repealed which 
bound me ; again, if I could not, I might retire from 
ParKament or office, and so rid myself of the engage- 
ment I had made ; but I should be clear that, though 
the Pope bade all Catholics to stand firm in one pha- 
lanx for the Catholic Succession, still, while I remained 
in my office, or in my place in Parliament, I could not 
do as he bade me. 

Again, were I actually a soldier or sailor in Her 
Majesty's service, and sent to take part in a .war which 
I could not in my conscience see to be unjust, and 
should the Pope suddenly bid all Catholic soldiers 
and sailors to retire from the service, here again, taking 
the advice of others, as best I could, I should not obey 
him. 

What is the use of forming impossible cases ? One 
can find plenty of them in books of casuistry, with the 
answers attached in respect to them. In an actual case, 
a Catholic would, of course, not act simply on his own 
judgment ; at the same time, there are supposable cases 
in which he would be obliged to go by it solely — viz., 
when his conscience could not be reconciled to any of 
the courses of action proposed to him by others. 



100 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

In support of what I have been saying, I refer to 
one or two weighty authorities : — 

Cardinal Turrecremata says : " Although it clearly 
follows from the circumstance that the Pope can err 
at times, and command things which must not be 
done, that we are not to be simply obedient to him in 
all things, that does not show that he must not be 
obeyed by all when his commands are good. To know 
in what cases he is to be obeyed and in what not . . . 
it is said in the Acts of the Apostles, ' One ought to 
obey God rather than man ; ' therefore, were the Pope 
to command anything against Holy Scripture, or the 
articles of faith, or the truth of the Sacraments, or 
the commands of the natural or divine law, he ought 
not to he obeyed^ but in such commands to be passed 
over (despiciendus)." Summ. de EccL^ pp. 47, 48. 

Bellarmine, speaking of resisting the Pope, says: 
" In order to resist and defend one's self no authority 
is required. . . . Therefore, as it is lawful to resist the 
Pope, if he assaulted a man's person, so it is lawful to 
resist him if he assaulted souls, or troubled the state^ 
(turbanti rempublicam,) and much more if he strove 
to destroy the Church. It is lawful, I say, to resist him, 
by not doing what he commands, and hindering the 
execution of his will." De Horn.. Pont.^ ii, 29. 

Archbishop Kenrick says : " His power was given 
for edification, not for destruction. If he uses it from 
the love of domination (quod absit) scarcely will he 
meet with obedient populations^ TheoL Morale t. i, 
p. 158. 

When, then, Mr. Gladstone asks Catholics how they 
can obey the Queen and yet obey the Pope, since it 
may happen that the commands of the two authorities 



DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 101 

may clasli, I answer, that it is my rule^ both to obey 
the one and to obey the other, but that there is no 
rule in this world without exceptions, and if either the 
Pope or the Queen demanded of me an " Absolute 
Obedience," he or she would be trangressing the laws 
of human nature and human society. I give an abso- 
lute obedience to neither. Further, if ever this double 
allegiance pulled me in contrary ways, which in this 
age of the world I think it never will, then I should 
decide according to the particular case, which is be- 
yond all rule, and must be decided on its own merits. 
I should look to see what theologians could do for me, 
what the Bishops and clergy around me, what my 
confessor ; what friends whom I revered : and if, after 
all, I could not take their view of the matter, then I 
must rule myself by my own judgment and my own 
conscience. But all this is hypothetical and unreal. 

Here, of course, it will be objected to me, that I 
am, after all, having recourse to the Protestant doc- 
trine of Private Judgment ; not so ; it is the Protest- 
ant doctrine that Private Judgment is our ordinary 
guide in religious matters, but I use it, in the case in 
question, in very extraordinary and rare, nay, impos- 
sible emergencies. Do not the highest Tories thus 
defend the substitution of William for James II ? It 
is a great mistake to suppose our state in the Catholic 
Church is so entirely subjected to rule and system, that 
we are never thrown upon what is called by divines 
" the Providence of God." The teaching and assist- 
ance of the Church does not supply all conceivable 
needs, but those which are ordinary ; thus, for in- 
stance, the sacraments are necessary for dying in 
the grace of God and hope of heaven, yet, when they 



102 PEOSE AND POETBY OF NEWMAN 

cannot be got, acts o£ hope, faith, and contrition, with 
the desire for those aids which the dying man has not, 
will convey in substance what those aids ordinarily 
convey. And so a Catechumen, not yet baptized, may 
be saved by his purpose and preparation to receive the 
rite. And so, again, though " Out of the Church there 
is no salvation," this does not hold in the case of good 
men who are in invincible ignorance. And so it is also 
in the case of our ordinations ; Chillingworth and 
Macaulay say that it is morally impossible that we 
should have kept up for 1800 years an Apostolical 
succession of ministers without some separation of the 
chain ; and we in answer say that, however true this 
may be, humanly speaking, there has been a special 
Providence over the Church to secure it. Once more, 
how else could private Catholics save their souls when 
there was a Pope and Anti-popes, each severally claim- 
ing their allegiance? 



Ill 



SELECTIONS FROM "THE IDEA OF A 
UNIVERSITY" 

LITERATURE 

Thought and speech are inseparable from each 
other. Matter and expression are parts of one ; style is 
a thinking out into language. This is what I have been 
laying down, and this is literature : not things^ not the 
verbal symbols of things ; not on the other hand mere 
words ; but thoughts expressed in language. Call to 
mind, Gentlemen, the meaning of the Greek word which 
expresses this special prerogative of man over the 
feeble intelligence of the inferior animals. It is called 
Logos : what does Logos mean ? it stands both for 
reason and for speech^ and it is difficult to say which 
it means more properly. It means both at once : why? 
because really they cannot be divided, — because they 
are in a true sense one. When we can separate light 
and illumination, life and motion, the convex and the 
concave of a curve, then will it be possible for thought 
to tread speech under foot, and to hope to do without 
it — then will it be conceivable that the vigorous and 
fertile intellect should renounce its own double, its 
instrument of expression, and the channel of its specu- 
lations and emotions. 

Critics should consider this view of the subject be- 
fore they lay down such canons of taste as the writer 
whose pages I have quoted. Such men as he is con- 
sider fine writing to be an addition from without to 
the matter treated of, — a sort of ornament superin- 



104 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

duced, or a luxury indulged In, by those who have 
time and inclination for such vanities. They speak as 
if one man could do the thought, and another the 
style. We read in Persian travels of the way in which 
young gentlemen go to work in the East, when they 
would engage in correspondence with those who inspire 
them with hope or fear. They cannot write one sen- 
tence themselves; so they betake themselves to the 
professional letter- writer. They confide to him the ob- 
ject they have in view. They have a point to gain 
from a superior, a favour to ask, an evil to deprecate ; 
they have to approach a man in power, or to make 
court to some beautiful lady. The professional man 
manufactures words for them, as they are wanted, as 
a stationer sells them paper, or a schoolmaster might 
cut their pens. Thought and word are, in their con- 
ception, two things, and thus there is a division of 
labour. The man of thought comes to the man of 
words ; and the man of words, duly instructed in the 
thought, dips the pen of desire into the ink of devot- 
edness, and proceeds to spread it over the page of 
desolation. Then the nightingale of affection is heard 
to warble to the rose of loveliness, while the breeze of 
anxiety plays around the brow of expectation. This 
is what the Easterns are said to consider fine writing ; 
and it seems pretty much the idea of the school of 
critics to whom I have been referring. 

We have an instance in literary history of this very 
proceeding nearer home, in a great University, in the 
latter years of the last century. I have referred to it 
before now in a public lecture elsewhere ; ^ but it is 
too much in point here to be omitted. A learned Ara- 
^ Position of Catholics in England^ 



LITEBATURE 105 

jbic scholar had to deliver a set of lectures before its 
doctors and professors on an historical subject in which 
his reading had lain. A linguist is conversant with 
science rather than with literature ; but this gentle- 
man felt that his lectures must not be without a style. 
Being of the opinion of the Orientals, with whose 
writings he was familiar, he determined to buy a style. 
He took the step of engaging a person, at a price, to 
turn the matter which he had got together into orna- 
mental English. Observe, he did not wish for mere 
grammatical English, but for an elaborate, preten- 
tious style. An artist was found in the person of a 
country curate, and the job was carried out. His lec- 
tures remain to this day, in their own place in the 
protracted series of annual Discourses to which they 
belong, distinguished amid a number of heavy ish com- 
positions by the rhetorical and ambitious diction for 
which he went into the market. This learned divine, 
indeed, and the author I have quoted, differ from each 
other in the estimate they respectively form of liter- 
ary composition ; but they agree together in this, — 
in considering such composition a trick and a trade ; 
they put it on a par with the gold plate and the flowers 
and the music of a banquet, which do not make the 
viands better, but the entertainment more pleasurable ; 
as if language were the hired servant, the mere mis- 
tress of the reason, and not the lawful wife in her own 
house. 

But can they really think that Homer, or Pindar, 
or Shakespeare, or Dryden, or Walter Scott, were 
accustomed to aim at diction for its own sake, instead 
of being inspired with their subject, and pouring forth 
beautiful words because they had beautiful thoughts ? 



106 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

this IS surely too great a paradox to be borne. Rather, 
it is the fire within the author's breast which overflows 
in the torrent of his burning, irresistible eloquence ; 
it is the poetry of his inner soul, which relieves itself 
in the Ode or the Elegy ; and his mental attitude and 
bearing, the beauty of his moral countenance, the force 
and keenness of his logic, are imaged in the tenderness, 
or energy, or richness of his language. Nay, according 
to the well-known line, " facit indignatio versus ; " 
not the words alone, but even the rhythm, the metre, 
the verse, will be the contemporaneous offspring of the 
emotion or imagination which possesses him. "Poeta 
nascitur, non fit," says the proverb; and this is in 
numerous instances true of his poems, as well as of him- 
self. They are born, not framed ; they are a strain 
rather than a composition ; and their perfection is the 
monument, not so much of his skill as of his power. 
And this is true of prose as well as of verse in its 
degree : who will not recognize in the Vision of Mirza 
a delicacy and beauty of style which is very difficult to 
describe, but which is felt to be in exact correspondence 
to the ideas of which it is the expression ? 

And, since the thoughts and reasonings of an author 
have, as I have said, a personal character, no wonder 
that his style is not only the image of his subject, but 
of his mind. That pomp of language, that full and 
tuneful diction, that felicitousness in the choice and 
exquisiteness in the collocation of words, which to pro- 
saic writers seem artificial, is nothing else but the mere 
habit and way of a lofty intellect. Aristotle, in his 
sketch of the magnanimous man, tells us that his voice 
is deep, his motions slow, and his stature commanding. 



LITERATURE 107 

In like manner, the elocution of a great intellect is 
great. His language expresses, not only his great 
thoughts, but his great seK. Certainly he might use 
fewer words than he uses ; but he fertilizes his sim- 
plest ideas, and germinates into a multitude of details, 
and prolongs the march of his sentences, and sweeps 
round to the full diapason of his harmony, as if Kv^d 
yatwv, rejoicing in his own vigour and richness of re- 
source. I say, a narrow critic will call it verbiage, 
when really it is a sort of fulness of heart, parallel to 
that which makes the merry boy whistle as he walks, 
or the strong man, like the smith in the novel, flourish 
his club when there is no one to fight with. 

Shakespeare furnishes us with frequent instances of 
this peculiarity, and all so beautiful, that it is difficult 
to select for quotation. For instance, in Macbeth : — 

" Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased, 
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, 
Raze out the written troubles of the brain, 
And, with some sweet oblivious antidote, 
Cleanse the foul bosom of that perilous stuff. 
Which weighs upon the heart ? " 

Here a simple idea, by a process which belongs to 
the orator rather than to the poet, but still comes from 
the native vigour of genius, is expanded into a many- 
membered period. 

The following from Hamlet is of the same kind : — 

" *T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother. 
Nor customary suits of solemn black, 
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath. 
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye. 
Nor the dejected haviour of the visage. 
Together with all forms, modes, shows of grief, 
That can denote me truly." 



108 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Now, if such declamation, for declamation it is, how- 
ever noble, be allowable in a poet, whose genius is so 
far removed from pompousness or pretence, much more 
is it allowable in an orator, whose very province it is 
to put forth words to the best advantage he can. Cicero 
has nothing more redundant in any part of his writings 
than these passages from Shakespeare. No lover then 
at least of Shakespeare may fairly accuse Cicero of 
gorgeousness of phraseology or diffuseness of style. Nor 
will any sound critic be tempted to do so. As a certain 
unaffected neatness and propriety and grace of diction 
may bp required of any author who lays claim to be a 
classic, for the same reason that a certain attention to 
dress is expected of every gentleman, so to Cicero may 
be allowed the privilege of the " os magna sonaturum,'' 
of which the ancient critic speaks. His copious, majes- 
tic, musical flow of language, even if sometimes beyond 
what the subject-matter demands, is never out of keep- 
ing with the occasion or with the speaker. It is the 
expression of lofty sentiments in lofty sentences, the 
" mens magna in corpore magno." It is the develop- 
ment of the inner man. Cicero vividlv realised the 
status of a Koman senator and statesman, and the 
" pride of place " of Rome, in all the grace and grand- 
eur which attached to her ; and he imbibed, and be- 
came, what he admired. As the exploits of Scipio or 
Pompey are the expression of this greatness in deed, 
so the language of Cicero is the expression of it in 
word. And, as the acts of the Roman ruler or soldier 
represent to us, in a manner special to themselves, the 
characteristic magnanimity of the lords of the earth, 
so do the speeches or treatises of her accomplished 
orator bring it home to our imaginations as no other 



LITERATURE 109 

writing could do. Neither Livy, nor Tacitus, nor Ter- 
ence, nor Seneca, nor Pliny, nor Quintilian, is an 
adequate spokesman for the Imperial City. They write 
Latin ; Cicero writes Koman. 

You will say that Cicero's language is undeniably 
studied, but that Shakespeare's is as undeniably natural 
and spontaneous ; and that this is what is meant, when 
the Classics are accused of being mere artists of words. 
Here we are introduced to a further large question, 
which gives me the opportunity of anticipating a mis- 
apprehension of my meaning. I observe, then, that, not 
only is that lavish richness of style, which I have no- 
ticed in Shakespeare, justifiable on the principles which 
I have been laying down, but, what is less easy to re- 
ceive, even elaborateness in composition is no mark of 
trick or artifice in an author. Undoubtedly the works 
of the Classics, particularly the Latin, are elaborate ; 
they have cost a great deal of time, care, and trouble. 
They have had many rough copies ; I grant it. I grant 
also that there are writers of name, ancient and mod- 
ern, who really are guilty of the absurdity of making 
sentences, as the very end of their literary labour. 
Such was Isocrates ; such were some of the sophists ; 
they were set on words, to the neglect of thoughts or 
things ; I cannot defend them. If I must give an Eng- 
lish instance of this fault, much as I love and revere 
the personal character and intellectual vigour of Dr. 
Johnson, I cannot deny that his style often outruns 
the sense and the occasion, and is wanting in that sim- 
plicity which is the attribute of genius. Still, granting 
all this, I cannot grant, notwithstanding, that genius 
never need take pains, — that genius may not improve 



110 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

by practice, — that it never incurs failures, and suc- 
ceeds the second time, — that it never finishes off at 
leisure what it has thrown off in the outline at a stroke. 
Take the instance of the painter or the sculptor ; he 
has a conception in his mind which he wishes to repre- 
sent in the medium of his art ; — the Madonna and 
Child, or Innocence, or Fortitude, or some historical 
character or event. Do you mean to say he does not 
study his subject ? does he not make sketches ? does he 
not even call them ''studies"? does he not call his 
workroom a studio? is he not ever designing, rejecting, 
adopting, correcting, perfecting ? Are not the first at- 
tempts of Michael Angelo and Raffaelle extant, in the 
case of some of their most celebrated compositions? 
Will any one say tha,t the Apollo Belvedere is not a 
conception patiently elaborated into its proper perfec- 
tion ? These departments of taste are, according to the 
received notions of the world, the very province of gen- 
ius, and yet we call them arts ; they are the " Fine 
Arts." Why may not that be true of literary compo- 
sition which is true of painting, sculpture, architecture, 
and music? Why may not language be wrought as well 
as the clay of the modeller ? why may not words be 
worked up as well as colours ? why should not skill in 
diction be simply subservient and instrumental to the 
great prototypal ideas which are the contemplation of 
a Plato or a Virgil ? Our greatest poet tells us, — 

" The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, 
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven, 
And, as imagination bodies forth 
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen 
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing 
A local habitation and a name.'' 



LITERATURE 111 

Now, IS it wonderful that that pen of his should 
sometimes be at fault for a while, — that it should 
pause, write, erase, re-write, amend, complete, before he 
satisfies himself that his language has done justice to 
the conceptions which his mind's eye contemplated ? 

In this point of view, doubtless, many or most writers 
are elaborate ; and those certainly not the least whose 
style is furthest removed from ornament, being simple 
and natural, or vehement, or severely business-like and 
practical. Who so energetic and manly as Demos- 
thenes ? Yet he is said to have transcribed Thucydides 
many times over in the formation of his style. Who so 
gracefully natural as Herodotus ? yet his very dialect 
is not his own, but chosen for the sake of the perfection 
of his narrative. Who exhibits such happy negligence 
as our own Addison ? yet artistic fastidiousness was so 
notorious in his instance that the report has got abroad, 
truly or not, that he was too late in his issue of an 
important state-paper, from his habit of revision and 
recomposition. Such great authors were working by a 
model which was before the eyes of their intellect, and 
they were labouring to say what they had to say, in 
such a way as would most exactly and suitably express 
it. It is not wonderful that other authors, whose style 
is not simple, should be instances of a similar literary 
diligence. Virgil wished his ^neid to be burned, elab- 
orate as is its composition, because he felt it needed 
more labour still, in order to make it perfect. The 
historian Gibbon in the last century is another instance 
in point. You must not suppose I am going to recom- 
mend his style for imitation, any more than his prin- 
ciples ; but I refer to him as the example of a writer 
feeling the task which lay before him, feeling that he 



112 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

had to bring out into words for the comprehension of 
his readers a great and complicated scene, and wishing 
that those words should be adequate to his undertak- 
ing. I think he wrote the first chapter of his History 
three times over ; it was not that he corrected or im- 
proved the first copy ; but he put his first essay, and 
then his second, aside — he recast his matter, till he 
had hit the precise exhibition of it which he thought 
demanded by his subject. 

Now in all these instances, I wish you to observe, 
that what I have admitted about literary workmanship 
differs from the doctrine which I am opposing in this, 
— that the mere dealer in words cares little or nothing 
for the subject which he is embellishing, but can paint 
and gild anything whatever to order ; whereas the art- 
ist, whom I am acknowledging, has his great or rich 
visions before him, and his only aim is to bring out 
what he thinks or what he feels in a way adequate to 
the thing spoken of, and appropriate to the speaker. 

The illustration which I have been borrowing from 
the Fine Arts will enable me to go a step further. I 
have been showing the connection of the thought with 
the language in literary composition ; and in doing so 
I have exposed the unphilosophical notion, that the 
language was an extra which could be dispensed with, 
and provided to order according to the demand. But 
I have not yet brought out, what immediately follows 
from this, and which was the second point which I 
had to show, viz., that to be capable of easy transla- 
tion is no test of the excellence of a composition. If 
I must say what I think, I should lay down, with little 
hesitation, that the truth was almost the reverse of this 



LITERATURE 113 

doctrine. Nor are many words required to show it. 
Such a doctrine, as is contained in the passage of the 
author whom I quoted when I began, goes upon the 
assumption that one language is just like another lan- 
guage, — that every language has all the ideas, turns 
of thought, delicacies of expression, figures, associa- 
tions, abstractions, points of view, which every other 
language has. Now, as far as regards Science, it is 
true that all languages are pretty much alike for the 
purposes of Science ; but even in this respect some are 
more suitable than others, which have to coin words, 
or to borrow them, in order to express scientific ideas. 
But if languages are not all equally adapted even to 
furnish symbols for those universal and eternal truths 
in which Science consists, how can they reasonably be 
expected to be all equally rich, equally forcible, equally 
musical, equally exact, equally happy in expressing the 
idiosyncratic peculiarities of thought of some original 
and fertile mind, who has availed himself of one of 
them ? A great author takes his native language, mas- 
ters it, partly throws himself into it, partly moulds 
and adapts it, and pours out his multitude of ideas 
through the variously ramified and delicately minute 
channels of expression which he has found or framed : 
— does it follow that this his personal presence (as it 
may be called) can forthwith be transferred to every 
other language under the sun ? Then may we reason- 
ably maintain that Beethoven's piano music is not 
really beautiful, because it cannot be played on the 
hurdy-gurdy. Were not this astonishing doctrine main- 
tained by persons far superior to the writer whom I 
have selected •for animadversion, I should find it difii- 
cult to be patient under a gratuitous extravagance. 



-114 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

It seems that a really great author must admit of 
translation, and that we have a test of his excellence 
when he reads to advantage in a foreign language 
as well as in his own. Then Shakespeare is a genius 
because he can be translated into German, and not 
a genius because he cannot be translated into French. 
Then the multiplication-table is the most gifted of all 
conceivable compositions, because it loses nothing by- 
translation, and can hardly be said to belong to any 
one language whatever. Whereas I should rather have 
conceived that, in proportion as ideas are novel and 
recondite, they would be difficult to put into words, 
and that the very fact of their having insinuated them- 
selves into one language would diminish the chance of 
that happy accident being repeated in another. In the 
language of savages you can hardly express any idea 
or act of the intellect at all : is the tongue of the 
Hottentot or Esquimaux to be made the measure of 
the genius of Plato, Pindar, Tacitus, St. Jerome, 
Dante, or Cervantes ? 

Let us recur, I say, to the illustration of the Fine 
Arts. I suppose you can express ideas in painting 
which you cannot express in sculpture ; and the more 
an artist is of a painter, the less he is likely to be of 
a sculptor. The more he commits his genius to the 
methods and conditions of his own art, the less he will 
be able to throw himself into the circumstances of 
another. Is the genius of Fra Angelico, of Francia, or 
of Raffaelle disparaged by the fact that he was able 
to do that in colours which no man that ever lived, 
which no Angel, could achieve in wood ? Each of the 
Fine Arts has its own subject-matter ; from the nature 
of the case you can do in one what you cannot do in 



LITERATURE 115 

another ; you can do in painting what you cannot do 
in carving ; you can do in oils what you cannot do in 
fresco ; you can do in marble what you cannot do in 
ivory ; you can do in wax what you cannot do in bronze. 
Then, I repeat, applying this to the case of languages, 
why should not genius be able to do in Greek what it 
cannot do in Latin ? and why are its Greek and Latin 
works defective because they will not turn into Eng- 
lish ? That genius, of which we are speaking, did not 
make English ; it did not make all languages, present, 
past, and future ; it did not make the laws of any 
language : why is it to be judged of by that in which 
it had no part, over which it has no control ? 

And now we are naturally brought on to our third 
point, which is on the characteristics of Holy Scrip- 
ture as compared with profane literature. Hitherto we 
have been concerned with the doctrine of these writers, 
viz. that style is an extra^ that it is a mere artifice, and 
that hence it cannot be translated ; now we come to 
their fact, viz. that Scripture has no such artificial 
style, and that Scripture can easily be translated. 
Surely their fact is as untenable as their doctrine. 

Scripture easy of translation ! then why have there 
been so few good translators ? why is it that there has 
been such great difficulty in combining the two neces- 
sary qualities, fidelity to the original and purity in the 
adopted vernacular ? why is it that the authorized ver- 
sions of the Church are often so inferior to the orig- 
inal as compositions, except that the Church is bound 
above all things to see that the version is doctrinally 
correct, and in a difficult problem is obliged to put up 
with defects in what is of secondary importance, pro- 



116 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

vided she secure what is of first ? If it were so easy 
to transfer the beauty of the original to the copy, she 
would not have been content with her received version 
in various languages which could be named. 

And then in the next place, Scripture not elab- 
orate ! Scripture not ornamented in diction, and 
musical in cadence ! Why, consider the Epistle to the 
Hebrews — where is there in the Classics any compo- 
sition more carefully, more artificially written ? Con- 
sider the book of Job ^ — is it not a sacred drama, as 
artistic, as perfect, as any Greek tragedy of Sopho- 
cles or Euripides ? Consider the Psalter — are there 
no ornaments, no rhythm, no studied cadences, no re- 
sponsive members, in that divinely beautiful book ? 
And is it not hard to understand ? are not the Pro- 
phets hard to understand ? is not St. Paul hard to 
understand? Who can say that these are popular com- 
positions ? who can say that they are level at first 
reading with the understandings of the multitude ? 

That there are portions indeed of the inspired vol- 
ume more simple both in style and in meaning, and 
that these are the more sacred and sublime passages, 
as, for instance, parts of the Gospels, I grant at once ; 
but this does not militate against the doctrine I have 
been laying down. Recollect, Gentlemen, my distinc- 
tion when I began. I have said Literature is one thing, 
and that Science is another; that Literature has to 
do with ideas, and Science with realities ; that Litera- 
ture is of a personal character, that Science treats of 
what is universal and eternal. In proportion, then, as 
Scripture excludes the personal colouring of its writers, 
and rises into the region of pure and mere inspiration, 
when it ceases in any sense to be the writing of man, 



LITERATURE 117 

of St. Paul or St. John, of Moses or Isaias, then it 
comes to belong to Science, not Literature. Then 
it conveys the things of heaven, unseen verities, divine 
manifestations, and them alone — not the ideas, the 
feelings, the aspirations, of its human instruments, 
who, for all that they were inspired and infallible, did 
not cease to be men. St. Paul's epistles, then, I con- 
sider to be literature in a real and true sense, as per- 
sonal, as rich in reflection and emotion, as Demos- 
thenes or Euripides ; and, without ceasing to be re- 
velations of objective truth, they are expressions of 
the subjective notwithstanding. On the other hand, 
portions of the Gospels, of the book of Genesis, and 
other passages of the Sacred Volume, are of the 
nature of Science. Such is the beginning of St. John's 
Gospel, which we read at the end of Mass. Such is 
the Creed. I mean, passages such as these are the 
mere enunciation of eternal things, without (so to say) 
the medium of any human mind transmitting them to 
us. The words used have the grandeur, the majesty, 
the calm, unimpassioned beauty of Science ; they are 
in no sense Literature, they are in no sense personal ; 
and therefore they are easy to apprehend, and easy to 
translate. 

Did time admit I could show you parallel instances 
of what I am speaking of in the Classics, inferior to 
the inspired word in proportion as the subject-matter 
of the classical authors is immensely inferior to the 
subjects treated of in Scripture — but parallel, inas- 
much as the classical author or speaker ceases for the 
moment to have to do with Literature, as speaking of 
things objectively, and rises to the serene sublimity 
of Science. But I should be carried too far if I began. 



118 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

I shall then merely sum up what I have said, and 
come to a conclusion. Reverting, then, to my original 
question, what is the meaning of Letters, as contained. 
Gentlemen, in the designation of your Faculty, I have 
answered, that by Letters or Literature is meant the 
expression of thought in language, where by " thought" 
I mean the ideas, feelings, views, reasonings, and other 
operations of the human mind. And the Art of Letters 
is the method by which a speaker or writer brings out 
in words, worthy of his subject, and sufficient for his 
audience or readers, the thoughts which impress him. 
Literature, then, is of a personal character ; it consists 
in the enunciations and teachings of those who have 
a right to speak as representatives of their kind, and 
in whose words their brethren find an interpretation of 
their own sentiments, a record of their own experience, 
and a suggestion for their own judgments. A great 
author, Gentlemen, is not one who merely has a copia 
verhorum^ whether in prose or verse, and can, as it 
were, turn on at his will any number of splendid 
phrases and swelling sentences ; but he is one who has 
something to say and knows how to say it. I do not 
claim for him, as such, any great depth of thought, 
or breadth of view, or philosophy, or sagacity, or know- 
ledge of human nature, or experience of human life, 
though these additional gifts he may have, and the 
more he has of them the greater he is ; but I ascribe 
to him, as his characteristic gift, in a large sense the 
faculty of Expression. He is master of the twofold 
Logos, the thought and the word, distinct, but insepar- 
able from each other. He may, if so be, elaborate his 
compositions, or he may pour out his improvisations, 
but in either case he has but one aim, which he keeps 



LITERATURE 119 

steadily before him, and is conscientious and single- 
minded in fulfilling. That aim is to give forth what 
he has within him ; and from his very earnestness it 
comes to pass that, whatever be the splendour of his 
diction or the harmony of his periods, he has with him 
the charm of an incommunicable simplicity. What- 
ever be his subject, high or low, he treats it suitably 
and for its own sake. If he is a poet, " nil molitur 
inepte,^^ If he is an orator, then too he speaks, not 
only " distincte " and " splendide," but also " apteJ'* 
His page is the lucid mirror of his mind and life — 

" Quo fit, ut omnis 
Votiva pateat veluti descripta tabella 
Vita senis." 

He writes passionately, because he feels keenly ; for- 
cibly, because he conceives vividly ; he sees too clearly 
to be vague ; he is too serious to be otiose ; he can ana- 
lyze his subject, and therefore he is rich ; he embraces 
it as a whole and in its parts, and therefore he is con- 
sistent ; he has a firm hold of it, and therefore he is 
luminous. When his imagination wells up, it overflows 
in ornament ; when his heart is touched, it thrills along 
his verse. He always has the right word for the right 
idea, and never a word too much. If he is brief, it is 
because few words suffice ; when he is lavish of them, 
still each word has its mark, and aids, not embarrasses, 
the vigorous march of his elocution. He expresses what 
all feel, but all cannot say ; and his sayings pass into 
proverbs among his people, and his phrases become 
household words and idioms of their daily speech, 
which is tesselated with the rich fragments of his lan- 
guage, as we see in foreign lands the marbles of Roman 



120 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

grandeur worked into the walls and pavements of 
modern palaces. 

Such pre-eminently is Shakespeare among ourselves ; 
such pre-eminently Virgil among the Latins ; such in 
their degree are all those writers who in every nation 
go by the name of Classics. To particular nations they 
are necessarily attached from the circumstance of the 
variety of tongues, and the peculiarities of each ; but 
so far they have a catholic and ecumenical character, 
that what they express is common to the whole race of 
man, and they alone are able to express it. 

If then the power of speech is a gift as great as any 
that can be named, — if the origin of language is by 
many philosophers even considered to be nothing short 
of divine, — if by means of words the secrets of the 
heart are brought to light, pain of soul is relieved, hid- 
den grief is carried off, sympathy conveyed, counsel 
imparted, experience recorded, and wisdom perpetuated, 
— if by great authors the many are drawn up into 
unity, national character is fixed, a people speaks, the 
past and the future, the East and the West are 
brought into communication with each other, — if such 
men are, in a word, the spokesmen and prophets of the 
human family, — it will not answer to make light of 
Literature or to neglect its study ; rather we may be 
sure that, in proportion as we master it in whatever 
language, and imbibe its spirit, we shall ourselves be- 
come in our own measure the ministers of like benefits 
to others, be they many or few, be they in the obscurer 
or the more distinguished walks of life, — who are 
united to us by social ties, and are within the sphere of 
our personal influence. 



ENGLISH CA THOLIC LITEM A TUBE 121 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE IN ITS RELATION 
TO CLASSICAL LITERATURE 

I have been directing the reader's attention, first to 
what we do not, and next to what we need not con- 
template, when we turn our thoughts to the formation 
of an English Catholic Literature. I said that our 
object was neither a library of theological nor of scien- 
tific knowledge, though theology in its literary aspect, 
and abstract science as an exercise of intellect, have 
both of course a place in the Catholic encyclopaedia. 
One undertaking, however, there is, which not merely 
does not, and need not, but unhappily cannot, come 
into the reasonable contemplation of any set of persons, 
whether members of a University or not, who are desir- 
ous of Catholicizing the English language, as is very 
evident ; and that is simply the creation of an English 
Classical Literature^ for that has been done long ago, 
and would be a work beyond the powers of any body 
of men, even if it had still to be done. If I insist on 
this point here, no one must suppose I do not consider 
it to be self-evident ; for I shall not be aiming at prov- 
ing it, so much as at bringing it home distinctly to the 
mind, that we may, one and all, have a clearer percep- 
tion of the state of things with which we have to deal. 
There is many an undeniable truth which is not prac- 
tically felt and appreciated ; and, unless we master our 
position in the matter before us, we may be led off into 
various wild imaginations or impossible schemes, which 
will, as a matter of course, end in disappointment. 

Were the Catholic Church acknowledged from this 
moment through the length and breadth of these 



122 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

islands, and the English tongue henceforth baptized 
into the Catholic faith, and sealed and consecrated to 
Catholic objects, and were the present intellectual 
activity of the nation to continue, as of course it would 
continue, we should at once have an abundance of Cath- 
olic works, which would be English, and purely English, 
literature and high literature ; but still all these would 
not constitute " English Literature," as the words are 
commonly understood, nor even then could we say that 
the " English Literature " was Catholic. Much less 
can we ever aspire to affirm it, while we are but a por- 
tion of the vast English-speaking world-wide race, and 
are but striving to create a current in the direction 
of Catholic truth, when the waters are rapidly flowing 
the other way. In no case can we, strictly speaking, 
form an English Literature ; for by the Literature of 
a Nation is meant its Classics, and its Classics have 
been given to England, and have been recognized as 
such, long since. 

A Literature, when it is formed, is a national and 
historical fact ; it is a matter of the past and the pre- 
sent, and can be as little ignored as the present, as 
little undone as the past. We can deny, supersede, or 
change it, then, only when we can do the same towards 
the race or language which it represents. Every great 
people has a character of its own, which it manifests 
and perpetuates in a variety of ways. It develops into 
a monarchy or republic ; — by means of commerce or 
in war, in agriculture or in manufactures, or in all of 
these at once ; in its cities, its public edifices and 
works, bridges, canals, and harbours ; in its laws, tra- 
ditions, customs, and manners ; in its songs and its 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE 123 

proverbs ; in its religion ; in its line of policy, its bear- 
ing, its action towards foreign nations ; in its alliances, 
fortunes, and the whole course of its history. All these 
are peculiar, and parts of a whole, and betoken the 
national character, and savour of each other ; and the 
case is the same with the national lang*uage and litera- 
ture. They are what they are, and cannot be anything 
else, whether they be good or bad or of a mixed na- 
ture ; before they are formed, we cannot prescribe 
them, and afterwards, we cannot reverse them. We 
may feel great repugnance to Milton or Gibbon as 
men ; we may most seriously protest against the spirit 
which ever lives, and the tendency which ever operates, 
in every page of their writings ; but there they are, an 
integral portion of English Literature ; we cannot ex- 
tinguish them ; we cannot deny their power ; we can- 
not write a new Milton or a new Gibbon ; we cannot 
expurgate what needs to be exorcised. They are great 
English authors, each breathing hatred to the Catho- 
lic Church in his own way, each a proud and rebel- 
lious creature of God, each gifted with incomparable 
gifts. 

We must take things as they are, if we take them 
at all. We may refuse to say a word to English Kter- 
ature, if we will ; we may have recourse to French or 
to Italian instead, if we think either of these less ex- 
ceptionable than our own ; we may fall back upon the 
Classics of Greece and Kome ; we may have nothing 
whatever to do with literature, as such, of any kind, 
and confine ourselves to purely amorphous or mon- 
strous specimens of language ; but if we do once pro- 
fess in our Universities the English language and lit- 
erature, if we think it allowable to know the state of 



124 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

things we live in, and that national character which we 
share, if we think it desirable to have a chance of writ- 
ing what may be read after our day, and praiseworthy 
to aim at providing for Catholics who speak English 
a Catholic Literature then, — I do not say that we 
must at once throw open every sort of book to the 
young, the weak, or the untrained, — I do not say that 
we may dispense with our ecclesiastical indexes and 
emendations, but — we must not fancy ourselves creat- 
ing what is already created in spite of us, and which 
never could at a moment be created by means of us, 
and we must recognize that historical literature, which 
is in occupation of the language, both as a fact, nay, 
and as a standard for ourselves. 

There is surely nothing either " temerarious " or 
paradoxical in a statement like this. The growth of 
a nation is like that of an individual ; its tone of voice 
and subjects for speech vary with its age. Each age 
has its own propriety and charm ; as a boy's beauty 
is not a man's, and the sweetness of a treble differs 
from the richness of a bass, so it is with a whole people. 
The same period does not produce its most popular 
poet, its most effective orator, and its most philosophic 
historian. Language changes with the progress of 
thought and the events of history, and style changes 
with it ; and while in successive generations it passes 
through a series of separate excellences, the respective 
deficiencies of all are supplied alternately by each. 
Thus language and literature may be considered as 
dependent on a process of nature, and admitting of 
subjection to her laws. Father Hardouin indeed, who 
maintained that, with the exception of Pliny, Cicero, 
Virgil's Georgics^ and Horace's Satires and Epistles^ 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITEEATUEE 125 

Latin literature was the work of the mediaeval monks, 
had the conception of a literature neither national nor 
historical ; but the rest of the world will be apt to 
consider time and place as necessary conditions in its 
formation, and will be unable to conceive of classical 
authors, except as either the elaboration of centuries, 
or the rare and fitful accident of genius. 

First-rate excellence in literature, as in other mat- 
ters, is either an accident or the outcome of a process ; 
and in either case demands a course of years to secure. 
We cannot reckon on a Plato, we cannot force an 
Aristotle, any more than we can command a fine har- 
vest, or create a coal-field. If a literature be, as I have 
said, the voice of a particular nation, it requires a ter- 
ritory and a period, as large as that nation's extent 
and history, to mature in. It is broader and deeper 
than the capacity of any body of men, however gifted, 
or any system of teaching, however true. It is the ex- 
ponent, not of truth, but of nature, which is true only 
in its elements. It is the result of the mutual action 
of a hundred simultaneous influences and operations, 
and the issue of a hundred strange accidents in inde- 
pendent places and times ; it is the scanty compensat- 
ing produce of the wild discipline of the world and of 
life, so fruitful in failures ; and it is the concentration 
of those rare manifestations of intellectual power, which 
no one can account for. It is made up, in the particu- 
lar language here under consideration, of human beings 
as heterogeneous as Burns and Bunyan, De Foe and 
Johnson, Goldsmith and Cowper, Law and Fielding, 
Scott and Byron. The remark has been made that the 
history of an author is the history of his works ; it is 
far more exact to say that, at least in the case of great 



126 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

writers, the history of their works is the history of their 
fortunes or their times. Each is, in his turn, the man 
of his age, the type of a generation, or the interpreter 
of a crisis. He is made for his day, and his day for 
him. Hooker would not have been, but for the exist- 
ence of Catholics and Puritans, the defeat of the 
former and the rise of the latter ; Clarendon would 
not have been without the Great Rebellion; Hobbes 
is the prophet of the reaction to scoffing infidelity; 
and Addison is the child of the Revolution and its 
attendant changes. If there be any of our classical 
authors, who might at first sight have been pronounced 
a University man, with the exception of Johnson, Ad- 
dison is he ; yet even Addison, the son and brother of 
clergymen, the fellow of an Oxford Society, the resi- 
dent of a College which still points to the walk which 
he planted, must be something more, in order to take 
his place among the Classics of the language, and owed 
the variety of his matter to his experience of life, and 
to the call made on his resources by the exigencies of 
his day. The world he lived in made him and used 
him. While his writings educated his own generation, 
they have delineated it for all posterity after him. 

I have been speaking of the authors of a literature, 
in their relation to the people and course of events to 
which they belong ; but a prior consideration, at which 
I have already glanced, is their connection with the 
language itself, which has been their organ. If they 
are in great measure the creatures of their times, they 
are on the other hand in a far higher sense the creators 
of their language. It is indeed commonly called their 
mother tongue, but virtually it did not exist till they 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE 127 

gave it life and form. All greater matters are carried 
on and perfected by a succession of individual minds ; 
what is true in the history of thought and of action is 
true of language also. Certain masters of composition, 
as Shakespeare, Milton, and Pope, the writers of the 
Protestant Bible and Prayer Book, Hooker and Addi- 
son, Swift, Hume, and Goldsmith, have been the mak- 
ing of the English language ; and as that language is 
a fact, so is the literature a fact, by which it is formed, 
and in which it lives. Men of great ability have taken 
it in hand, each in his own day, and have done for it 
what the master of a gymnasium does for the bodily 
frame. They have formed its limbs, and developed its 
strength ; they have endowed it with vigour, exercised 
it in suppleness and dexterity, and taught it grace. 
They have made it rich, harmonious, various, and pre- 
cise. They have furnished it with a variety of styles, 
which from their individuality may almost be called 
dialects, and are monuments both of the powers of the 
language and the genius of its cultivators. 

How real a creation, how sui generis^ is the style of 
Shakespeare, or of the Protestant Bible and Prayer 
Book, or of Swift, or of Pope, or of Gibbon, or of John- 
son ! Even were the subject-matter without meaning, 
though in truth the style cannot really be abstracted 
from the sense, still the style would, on that supposition, 
remain as perfect and original a work as Euclid's Ele- 
ments or a symphony of Beethoven. And, like music, 
it has seized upon the public mind ; and the literature 
of England is no longer a mere letter, printed in books, 
and shut up in libraries, but it is a living voice, which 
has gone forth in its expressions and its sentiments into 
the world of men, which daily thrills upon our ears and 



128 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

syllables our thoughts, which speaks to us through our 
correspondents, and dictates when we put pen to paper. 
Whether we will or no, the phraseology and diction of 
Shakespeare, of the Protestant formularies, of Milton, 
of Pope, of Johnson's Tahletalh^ and of Walter Scott, 
have become a portion of the vernacular tongue, the 
household words, of which perhaps we little guess the 
origin, and the very idioms of our familiar conversa- 
tion. The man in the comedy spoke prose without 
knowing it ; and we Catholics, without consciousness 
and without offence, are ever repeating the half sen- 
tences of dissolute playwrights and heretical partizans 
and preachers. So tyrannous is the literature of a 
nation ; it is too much for us. We cannot destroy or 
reverse it ; we may confront and encounter it, but we 
cannot make it over again. It is a great work of man, 
when it is no work of God's. 

I repeat, then, whatever we be able or unable to 
effect in the great problem which lies before us, any- 
how we cannot undo the past. English Literature 
will ever have been Protestant. Swift and Addison, 
the most native and natural of our writers. Hooker 
and Milton, the most elaborate, never can become our 
co-religionists ; and, though this is but the enunciation 
of a truism, it is not on that account an unprofitable 
enunciation. 

I trust we are not the men to give up an undertak- 
ing because it is perplexed or arduous ; and to do 
nothing because we cannot do everything. Much may 
be attempted, much attained, even granting English 
Literature is not Catholic. Something indeed may be 
said even in alleviation of the misfortune itself, on 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE 129 

which I have been insisting ; and with two remarks 
bearing upon this latter point I will bring this Section 
to an end. 

1, First, then, it is to be considered that, whether 
we look to countries Christian or heathen, we find the 
state of literature there as little satisfactory as it is in 
these islands ; so that, whatever are our difficulties 
here, they are not worse than those of Catholics all 
over the world. I would not indeed say a word 
to extenuate the calamity, under which we lie, of 
having a literature formed in Protestantism ; still, 
other literatures have disadvantages of their own ; and, 
though in such matters comparisons are impossible, I 
doubt whether we should be better pleased if our Eng- 
lish Classics were tainted with licentiousness, or de- 
faced by infidelity or scepticism. I conceive we should 
not much mend matters if we were to exchange litera- 
tures with the French, Italians, or Germans. About 
Germany, however, I will not speak ; as to France, it 
has great and religious authors ; its classical drama, 
even in comedy, compared with that of other litera- 
tures, is singularly unexceptionable ; but who is there 
that holds a place among its writers so historical and 
important, who is so copious, so versatile, so brilliant, 
as that Voltaire who is an open scoffer at everything 
sacred, venerable, or high-minded ? Nor can Rousseau, 
though he has not the pretensions of Voltaire, be ex- 
cluded from the classical writers of France. Again, 
the gifted Pascal, in the work on which his literary 
fame is mainly founded, does not approve himself to 
a Catholic judgment ; and Descartes, the first of French 
philosophers, was too independent in his inquiries to 
be always correct in his conclusions. The witty Rabe- 



130 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

lais is said, by a recent critic,^ to show covertly in his 
former publications, and openly in his latter, his 
*' dislike to the Church of Rome." La Fontaine was 
with difficulty brought, on his death-bed, to make pub- 
lic satisfaction for the scandal which he had done to 
religion by his immoral Contes^ though at length he 
threw into the fire a piece which he had just finished for 
the stage. Montaigne, whose Essays "make an epoch 
in literature," by '' their influence upon the tastes and 
opinions of Europe ; " whose " school embraces a large 
proportion of French and English literature ;" and of 
whose " brightness and felicity of genius there can be 
but one opinion," is disgraced, as the same writer tells 
us, by " a sceptical bias and great indifference of tem- 
perament ; " and " has led the way," as an habitual 
offender, "to the indecency too characteristic of 
French literature." 

Nor does Italy present a more encouraging picture. 
Ariosto, one of the few names, ancient or modem, who 
is allowed on all hands to occupy the first rank of 
Literature, is, I suppose, rightly arraigned by the 
author I have above quoted, of " coarse sensuality." 
Pulci, " by his sceptical insinuations, seems clearly to 
display an intention of exposing religion to contempt." 
Boccaccio, the first of Italian prose-writers, had in his 
old age touchingly to lament the corrupting tendency 
of his popular compositions ; and Bellarmine has to 
vindicate him, Dante, and Petrarch, from the charge 
of virulent abuse of the Holy See. Dante certainly 
does not scruple to place in his Inferno a Pope, whom 
the Church has since canonized, and his work on 
Monarchia is on the Index. Another great Floren- 

1 Hallam. 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE 131 

tine, Macchiavel, is on the Index also ; and Giannone, 
as great in political history at Naples as Macchiavel 
at Florence, is notorious for his disaffection to the 
interests of the Roman Pontiff. 

These are but specimens of the general character of 
secular literature, whatever be the people to whom it 
belongs. One literature may be better than another, 
but bad will be the best, when weighed in the balance 
of truth and morality. It cannot be otherwise ; human 
nature is in all ages and all countries the same ; and 
its literature, therefore, wiU ever and everywhere be 
one and the same also. Man's work will savour of 
man; in his elements and powers excellent and ad- 
mirable, but prone to disorder and excess, to error and 
to sin. Such too will be his literature ; it will have the 
beauty and the fierceness, the sweetness and the rank- 
ness, of the natural man, and, with all its richness and 
greatness, will necessarily offend the senses of those 
who, in the Apostle's words, are really " exercised to 
discern between good and evil." " It is said of the holy 
Sturme," says an Oxford writer, " that, in passing a 
horde of unconverted Germans, as they were bathing 
and gambolling in the stream, he was so overpowered 
by the intolerable scent which arose from them that he 
nearly fainted away." National Literature is, in a 
parallel way, the untutored movements of the reason, 
imagination, passions, and affections of the natural 
man, the leapings and the friskings, the plungings and 
the snortings, the sportings and the buffoonings, the 
clumsy play and the aimless toil, of the noble, lawless 
savage of God's intellectual creation. 

It is well that we should clearly apprehend a truth 
so simple and elementary as this, and not expect from 



132 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the nature of man, or the literature of the world, what 
they never held out to us. Certainly, I did not know 
that the world was to be regarded as favourable to 
Christian faith or practice, or that it would be break- 
ing any engagement with us, if it took a line divergent 
from our own. I have never fancied that we should 
have reasonable ground for surprise or complaint, 
though man's intellect puris naturalihus did prefer, 
of the two, liberty to truth, or though his heart cher- 
ished a leaning towards license of thought and speech 
in comparison with restraint. 

2. If we do but resign ourselves to facts, we shall 
soon be led on to the second reflection which I have 
promised — viz. that, not only are things not better 
abroad, but they might be worse at home. We have, 
it is true, a Protestant literature ; but then it is 
neither atheistical nor immoral; and in the case of at 
least half a dozen of its highest and most influential 
departments, and of the most popular of its authors, 
it comes to us with very considerable alleviations. For 
instance, there surely is a call on us for thankfulness 
that the most illustrious amongst English writers has 
so little of a Protestant about him that Catholics have 
been able, without extravagance, to claim him as their 
own, and that enemies to our creed have allowed that 
he is only not a Catholic, because, and as far as, his 
times forbade it. It is an additional satisfaction to be 
able to boast that he offends in neither of those two 
respects which reflect so seriously upon the reputation 
of great authors abroad. Whatever passages may be 
gleaned from his dramas disrespectful to ecclesiastical 
authority, still these are but passages ; on the other 



ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE 133 

hand, there is in Shakespeare neither contempt of re- 
ligion nor scepticism, and he upholds the broad laws 
of moral and divine truth with the consistency and se- 
verity of an ^schylus, Sophocles, or Pindar. There 
is no mistaking in his works on which side lies the 
right ; Satan is not made a hero, nor Cain a victim, 
but pride is pride, and vice is vice, and, whatever in- 
dulgence he may allow himself in light thoughts or 
unseemly words, yet his admiration is reserved for 
sanctity and truth. From the second chief fault of 
Literature, as indeed my last words imply, he is not 
so free ; but, often as he may offend against modesty, 
he is clear of a worse charge, sensuality, and hardly 
a passage can be instanced in all that he has written to 
seduce the imagination or to excite the passions. 

A rival to Shakespeare, if not in genius, at least in 
copiousness and variety, is found in Pope ; and he was 
actually a Catholic, though personally an unsatisfac- 
tory one. His freedom indeed from Protestantism is 
but a poor compensation for a false theory of religion 
in one of his poems ; but taking his works as a whole, 
we may surely acquit them of being dangerous to the 
reader, whether on the score of morals or of faith. 

Again, the special title of moralist in English Liter- 
ature is accorded by the public voice to Johnson, 
whose bias towards Catholicity is well known. 

If we were to ask for a report of our philosophers, 
the investigation would not be so agreeable ; for we 
have three of evil, and one of unsatisfactory repute. 
Locke is scarcely an honour to us in the standard of 
truth, grave and manly as he is ; and Hobbes, Hume, 
and Bentham, in spite of their abilities, are simply a 
disgrace. Yet, even in this department, we find some 



134 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

compensation in the names of Clarke, Berkeley, Butler, 
and Reid, and in a name more famous than them all. 
Bacon was too intellectually great to hate or to con- 
temn the Catholic faith; and he deserves by his 
writings to be called the most orthodox of Protestant 
philosophers. 

KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 

And hence the well-known doctrine of this author, 
(Lord Shaftesbury,) that ridicule is the test of truth ; 
for truth and virtue being beauty, and falsehood and 
vice deformity, and the feeling inspired by deformity 
being that of derision, as that inspired by beauty is 
admiration, it follows that vice is not a thing to weep 
about, but to laugh at. '' Nothing is ridiculous," he 
says, " but what is deformed ; nor is anything proof 
against raillery but what is handsome and just. And 
therefore 't is the hardest thing in the world to deny 
fair honesty the use of this weapon, which can never 
bear an edge against herself, and bears against every- 
thing contrary." 

And hence again, conscience, which intimates a Law- 
giver, being superseded by a moral taste or sentiment, 
which has no sanction beyond the constitution of our 
nature, it follows that our great rule is to contemplate 
ourselves, if we would gain a standard of life and 
morals. Thus he has entitled one of his Treatises 
a Soliloquy^ with the motto, 'VNec te quaesiveris 
extra ; " and he observes, "The chief interest of ambi- 
tion, avarice, corruption, and every sly insinuating 
vice, is to prevent this interview and familiarity of 
discourse, which is consequent upon close retirement 
and inward recess. 'T is the grand artifice of villainy 



KNOWLEDGE AND EELIGIOUS DUTY 135 

and lewdness, as well as of superstition and bigotry^ 
to put us upon terms of greater distance and formality 
with ourselves, and evade our proving method of so- 
liloquy. ... A passionate lover, whatever solitude he 
may affect, can never be truly by himself. ... 'T is 
the same reason which keeps the imaginary saint or 
mystic from being capable of this entertainment. In- 
stead of looking narrowly into his own nature and 
mind, that he may be no longer a mystery to himself, 
he is taken up with the contemplation of other mys- 
terious natures^ which he never can explain or com- 
prehend." 

Taking these passages as specimens of what I call 
the Religion of Philosophy, it is obvious to observe 
that there is no doctrine contained in them which is 
not in a certain sense true ; yet, on the other hand, 
that almost every statement is perverted and made 
false, because it is not the whole truth. They are ex- 
hibitions of truth under one aspect, and therefore in- 
sufficient ; conscience is most certainly a moral sense, 
but it is more ; vice, again, is a deformity, but it is 
worse. Lord Shaftesbury may insist, if he will, that 
simple and solitary fear cannot effect a moral conver- 
sion, and we are not concerned to answer him ; but 
he will have a difficulty in proving that any real con- 
version follows from a doctrine which makes virtue 
a mere point of good taste, and vice vulgar and ungen- 
tlemanlike. 

Such a doctrine is essentially superficial, and such 
will be its effects. It has no better measure of right 
and wrong than that of visible beauty and tangible 
fitness. Conscience indeed inflicts an acute pang, but 



136 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

that pang, forsooth, is irrational, and to reverence it is 
an illiberal superstition. But, if we will make light of 
what is deepest within us, nothing is left but to pay- 
homage to what is more upon the surface. To seem 
becomes to be; what looks fair will be good, what 
causes offence will be evil ; virtue will be what pleases, 
vice what pains. As well may we measure virtue by 
utility as by such a rule. Nor is this an imaginary ap- 
prehension ; we aU must recollect the celebrated senti- 
ment into which a great and wise man was betrayed, 
in the glowing eloquence of his valediction to the spirit 
of chivalry. '^ It is gone," cries Mr. Burke ; " that 
sensibility of principle, that chastity of honour, which 
felt a stain Kke a wound; which inspired courage, 
while it mitigated ferocity ; which ennobled whatever 
it touched, and under which vice lost half its evil hy 
losing all its grossness.^^ In the last clause of this 
beautiful sentence we have too apt an illustration of 
the ethical temperament of a civilized age. It is detec- 
tion, not the sin, which is. the crime; private life is 
sacred, and inquiry into it is intolerable ; and decency 
is virtue. Scandals, vulgarities, whatever shocks, 
whatever disgusts, are offences of the first order. 
Drinking and swearing, squalid poverty, improvidence, 
laziness, slovenly disorder, make up the idea of pro- 
fligacy : poets may say anything, however wicked, with 
impunity; works of genius may be read without 
danger or shame, whatever their principles ; fashion, 
celebrity, the beautiful, the heroic, will suffice to force 
any evil upon the community. The splendours of a 
court, and the charms of good society, wit, imagina- 
tion, taste, and high breeding, the prestige of rank, and 
the resources of wealth, are a screen, an instrument. 



KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 13T 

and an apology for vice and irreligion. And thus at 
length we find, surprising as the change may be, that 
that very refinement of Intellectualism, which began 
by repelling sensuality, ends by excusing it. Under the 
shadow indeed of the Church, and in its due develop- 
ment, Philosophy does service to the cause of moral- 
ity ; but, when it is strong enough to have a will of its 
own, and is lifted up with an idea of its own import- 
ance, and attempts to form a theory, and to lay down 
a principle, and to carry out a system of ethics, and 
undertakes the moral education of the man, then it 
does but abet evils to which at first it seemed instinct- 
ively opposed. True Religion is slow in growth, and, 
when once planted, is difficult of dislodgement ; but 
its intellectual counterfeit has no root in itself : it 
springs up suddenly, it suddenly withers. It appeals 
to what is in nature, and it falls under the dominion 
of the old Adam. Then, like dethroned princes, it 
keeps up a state and majesty, when it has lost the 
real power. Deformity is its abhorrence ; accordingly, 
since it cannot dissuade men from vice, therefore in 
order to escape the sight of its deformity, it embel- 
lishes it. It "skins and films the ulcerous place," which 
it cannot probe or heal, 

" Whiles rank corruption, mining all within, 
Infects unseen." 

And from this shallowness of philosophical Religion 
it comes to pass that its disciples seem able to fulfil cer- 
tain precepts of Christianity more readily and exactly 
than Christians themselves. St. Paul, as I have said, 
gives us a pattern of evangelical perfection ; he draws 
the Christian character in its most graceful form, and 



138 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

its most beautiful hues. He discourses of that charity 
which is patient and meek, humble and single-minded, 
disinterested, contented, and persevering. He tells us 
to prefer each the other before himself, to give way to 
each other, to abstain from rude words and evil speech, 
to avoid self-conceit, to be calm and grave, to be cheer- 
ful and happy, to observe peace with all men, truth 
and justice, courtesy and gentleness, all that is modest, 
amiable, virtuous, and of good repute. Such is St. 
Paul's exemplar of the Christian in his external rela- 
tions ; and, I repeat, the school of the world seems to 
send out living copies of this typical excellence with 
greater success than the Church. At this day the 
^' gentleman " is the creation, not of Christianity, but 
of civilization. But the reason is obvious. The world 
is content with setting right the surface of things; 
the Church aims at regenerating the very depths of the 
heart. She ever begins with the beginning ; and, as 
regards the multitude of her children, is never able to 
get beyond the beginning, but is continually employed 
in laying the foundation. She is engaged with what 
is essential, as previous and as introductory to the or- 
namental and the attractive. She is curing men and 
keeping them clear of mortal sin ; she is " treating of 
justice and chastity, and the judgment to come : " she 
is insisting on faith and hope, and devotion, and hon- 
esty, and the elements of charity ; and has so much to 
do with precept, that she almost leaves it to inspira- 
tions from Heaven to suggest what is of counsel and 
perfection. She aims at what is necessary rather than 
at what is desirable. She is for the many as well as 
for the few. She is putting souls in the way of salva- 
tion, that they may then be in a condition, if they 



KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 139 

shall be called upon, to aspire to the heroic, and to at- 
tain the full proportions, as well as the rudiments, of 
the beautiful. 

Such is the method, or the policy (so to call it), of 
the Church ; but Philosophy looks at the matter from 
a very different point of view : what have Philosophers 
to do with the terror of judgment or the saving of the 
soul? Lord Shaftesbury calls the former a sort of 
"panic fear." Of the latter he scoffingly complains 
that " the saving of souls is now the heroic passion of 
exalted spirits." Of course he is at liberty, on his 
principles, to pick and choose out of Christianity what 
he will; he discards the theological, the mysterious, 
the spiritual ; he makes selection of the morally or 
sesthetically beautiful. To him it matters not at all 
that he begins his teaching where he should end it ; it 
matters not that, instead of planting the tree, he 
merely crops its flowers for his banquet; he only aims 
at the present life, his philosophy dies with him ; if 
his flowers do but last to the end of his revel, he has 
nothing more to seek. When night comes, the with- 
ered leaves may be mingled with his own ashes ; he 
and they will have done their work, he and they will 
be no more. Certainly, it costs little to make men 
virtuous on conditions such as these ; it is like teach- 
ing them a language or an accomplishment, to write 
Latin or to play on an instrument,^ — the profession of 
an artist, not the commission of an Apostle. 

This embellishment of the exterior is almost the be- 
ginning and the end of philosophical morality. This is 
why it aims at being modest rather than humble ; this 
is how it can be proud at the very time that it is unas- 



140 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

suming. To humility indeed it does not even aspire ; 
humility is one of the most difficult of virtues both 
to attain and to ascertain. It lies close upon the heart 
itself, and its tests are exceedingly delicate and subtle. 
Its counterfeits abound ; however, we are little con- 
cerned with them here, for, I repeat, it is hardly pro- 
fessed even by name in the code of ethics which we are 
reviewing. As has been often observed, ancient civil- 
ization had not the idea, and had no word to express 
it : or rather, it had the idea, and considered it a 
defect of mind, not a virtue, so that the word which 
denoted it conveyed a reproach. As to the modern 
world, you may gather its ignorance of it by its 
perversion of the somewhat parallel term " condescen- 
sion." Humility or condescension, viewed as a virtue 
of conduct, may be said to consist, as in other things, 
so in our placing ourselves in our thoughts on a level 
with our inferiors ; it is not only a voluntary relin- 
quishment of the privileges of our own station, but an 
actual participation or assumption of the condition of 
those to whom we stoop. This is true humility, to feel 
and to behave as if we were low ; not, to cherish a 
notion of our importance, while we affect a low posi- 
tion. Such was St. Paul's humility, when he called 
himself " the least of the saints ; " such the humility of 
those many holy men who have considered themselves 
the greatest of sinners. It is an abdication, as far as 
their own thoughts are concerned, of those preroga- 
tives or privileges to which others deem them entitled. 
Now it is not a little instructive to contrast with this 
idea. Gentlemen, — with this theological meaning of 
the word " condescension," — its proper English sense ; 
put them in juxtaposition, and you will at once see 



KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 141 

the difference between the world's humility and the 
humility of the Gospel. As the world uses the word, 
" condescension " is a stooping indeed of the person, 
but a bending forward, unattended with any the 
slightest effort to leave by a single inch the seat in 
which it is so firmly established. It is the act of a 
superior, who protests to himself, while he commits 
it, that he is superior still, and that he is doing 
nothing else but an act of grace towards those on 
whose level, in theory, he is placing himself. And this 
is the nearest idea which the philosopher can form of 
the virtue of self-abasement ; to do more than this is 
to his mind a meanness or an hj^pocrisy, and at once 
excites his suspicion and disgust. What the world is, 
such it has ever been ; we know the contempt which 
the educated pagans had for the martyrs and confess- 
ors of the Church ; and it is shared by the anti-Cath- 
olic bodies of this day. 

Such are the ethics of Philosophy, when faithfully 
represented ; but an age like this, not pagan, but pro- 
fessedly Christian, cannot venture to reprobate humil- 
ity in set terms, or to make a boast of pride. Accord- 
ingly, it looks out for some expedient by which it may 
blind itself to the real state of the case. Humility, with 
its grave and self-denying attributes, it cannot love ; 
but what is more beautiful, what more winning, than 
modesty ? what virtue, at first sight, simulates humility 
so well ? though what in fact is more radically distinct 
from it ? In truth, great as is its charm, modesty is 
not the deepest or the most religious of virtues. 
Rather it is the advanced guard or sentinel of the soul 
militant, and watches continually over its nascent 
intercourse with the world about it. It goes the round 



142 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

of the senses ; it mounts up into the countenance ; it 
protects the eye and ear ; it reigns in the voice and 
gesture. Its province is the outward deportment, as 
other virtues have relation to matters theological, 
others to society, and others to the mind itself. And 
being more superficial than other virtues, it is more 
easily disjoined from their company ; it admits of being 
associated with principles or qualities naturally foreign 
to it, and is often made the cloak of feelings or ends 
for which it was never given to us. So little is it the 
necessary index of humility, that it is even compatible 
with pride. The better for the purpose of Philosophy ; 
hmnble it cannot be, so forthwith modesty becomes 
its humility. 

Pride, under such training, instead of running to 
waste in the education of the mind, is turned to ac- 
count ; it gets a new name ; it is called self-respect ; 
and ceases to be the disagreeable, uncompanionable 
quality which it is in itself. Though it be the motive 
principle of the soul, it seldom comes to view ; and 
when it shows itself, then delicacy and gentleness are 
its attire, and good sense and sense of honour direct 
its motions. It is no longer a restless agent, without 
definite aim ; it has a large field of exertion assigned 
to it, and it subserves those social interests which it 
would naturally trouble. It is directed into the chan- 
nel of industry, frugality, honesty, and obedience ; and 
it becomes the very staple of the religion and morality 
held in honour in a day like our own. It becomes the 
safeguard of chastity, the guarantee of veracity, in 
high and low ; it is the very household god of society, 
as at present constituted, inspiring neatness and de- 
cency in the servant girl, propriety of carriage and 



KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 143 

refined manners in her mistress, uprightness, manliness, 
and generosity in the head of the family. It diffuses 
a light over town and country ; it covers the soil with 
handsome edifices and smiling gardens ; it tills the 
field, it stocks and embellishes the shop. It is the 
stimulating principle of providence on the one hand, 
and of free expenditure on the other ; of an honourable 
ambition, and of elegant enjoyment. It breathes upon 
the face of the community, and the hollow sepulchre 
is forthwith beautiful to look upon. 

Refined by the civilization which has brought it into 
activity, this self-respect infuses into the mind an in- 
tense horror of exposure, and a keen sensitiveness of 
notoriety and ridicule. It becomes the enemy of ex- 
travagances of any kind; it shrinks from what are 
called scenes ; it has no mercy on the mock-heroic, on 
pretence or egotism, on verbosity in language, or what 
is called prosiness in conversation. It detests gross 
adulation ; not that it tends at all to the eradication 
of the appetite to which the flatterer ministers, but it 
sees the absurdity of indulging it, it imderstands the 
annoyance thereby given to others, and if a tribute 
must be paid to the wealthy or the powerful, it demands 
greater subtlety and art in the preparation. Thus 
vanity is changed into a more dangerous self-conceit, 
as being checked in its natural eruption. It teaches 
men to suppress their feelings, and to control their 
tempers, and to mitigate both the severity and the tone 
of their judgments. As Lord Shaftesbury would de- 
sire, it prefers playful wit and satire in putting down 
what is objectionable, as a more refined and good- 
natured, as well as a more effectual method, than the 
expedient which is natural to uneducated minds. It is 



144 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

from this impatience of the tragic and the bombastic 
that It Is now quietly but energetically opposing Itself 
to the unchristian practice of duelling, which it brands 
as simply out of taste, and as the remnant of a barbar- 
ous age ; and certainly it seems likely to effect what 
Religion has aimed at abolishing in vain. 

Hence it is that it is almost a definition of a gentle- 
man to say he is one who never inflicts pain. This 
description is both refined and, as far as it goes, accu- 
rate. He is mainly occupied in merely removing the 
obstacles which hinder the free and unembarrassed 
action of those about him ; and he concurs with their 
movements rather than takes the initiative himself. 
His benefits may be considered as parallel to what are 
called comforts or conveniences in arrangements of a 
personal nature : like an easy chair or a good fire, 
which do their part in dispelling cold and fatigue,, 
though nature provides both means of rest and animal 
heat without them. The true gentleman in like man-> 
ner carefully avoids whatever may cause a jar or a 
jolt in the minds of those with whom he is cast ; — aE 
clashing of opinion, or collision of feeling, all restraint^ 
or suspicion, or gloom, or resentment ; his great con^ 
cern being to make every one at their ease and at home. 
He has his eyes on all his company ; he is tender to- 
wards the bashful, gentle towards the distant, and mer- 
ciful towards the absurd ; he can recollect to whom he 
is speaking ; he guards against unseasonable allu- 
sions, or topics which may irritate ; he is seldom 
prominent in conversation, and never wearisome. He 
makes light of favours while he does them,^ and seems 
to be receiving when he is conferring. He never speaks 



KNOWLEDGE AND BELIGIOUS DUTY 145 

of himself except when compelled, never defends him- 
self by a mere retort, he has no ears for slander or 
gossip, is scrupulous in imputing motives to those who 
interfere with him, and interprets everything for the 
best. He is never mean or little in his disputes, never 
takes unfair advantage, never mistakes personalities or 
sharp sayings for arguments, or insinuates evil which 
he dare not say out. From a long-sighted prudence, he 
observes the maxim of the ancient sage, that we should 
ever conduct ourselves towards our enemy as if he 
were one day to be our friend. He has too much good 
sense to be affronted at insults, he is too well employed 
to remember injuries, and too indolent to bear malice. 
He is patient, forbearing, and resigned, on philosoph- 
ical principles ; he submits to pain, because it is inev- 
itable, to bereavement, because it is irreparable, and 
to death, because it is his destiny. If he engages in 
controversy of any kind, his disciplined intellect pre- 
serves him from the blundering discourtesy of better, 
perhaps, but less educated minds ; who, like blunt 
weapons, tear and hack instead of cutting clean, who 
mistake the point in argument, waste their strength 
on trifles, misconceive their adversary, and leave the 
question more involved than they find it. He may be 
right or wrong in his opinion, but he is too clear-headed 
to be unjust ; he is as simple as he is forcible, and as 
brief as he is decisive. Nowhere shall we find greater 
candour, consideration, indulgence : he throws himself 
into the minds of his opponents, he accounts for their 
mistakes. He knows the weakness of human reason as 
well as its strength, its province and its limits. If he 
be an unbeliever, he will be too profound and large- 
minded to ridicule religion or to act against it ; he is 



146 PROSE AND POETBY OF NEWMAN 

too wise to be a dogmatist or fanatic in his infidelity. 
He respects piety and devotion ; he even supports in- 
stitutions as venerable, beautiful, or useful, to which 
he does not assent ; he honours the ministers of religion, 
and it contents him to decline its mysteries without 
assailing or denouncing them. He is a friend of re- 
ligious toleration, and that, not only because his phil- 
osophy has taught him to look on all forms of faith 
with an impartial eye, but also from the gentleness and 
effeminacy of feeling, which is the attendant on civil- 
ization. 

Not that he may not hold a religion too, in his own 
way, even when he is not a Christian. In that case 
his religion is one of imagination and sentiment ; it is 
the embodiment of those ideas of the sublime, majestic, 
and beautiful, without which there can be no large 
philosophy. Sometimes he acknowledges the being of 
God, sometimes he invests an unknown principle or 
quality with the attributes of perfection. And this 
deduction of his reason, or creation of his fancy, he 
makes the occasion of such excellent thoughts, and the 
starting-point of so varied and systematic a teaching, 
that he even seems like a disciple of Christianity it- 
self. From the very accuracy and steadiness of his 
logical powers, he is able to see what sentiments are 
consistent in those who hold any religious doctrine at 
all, and he appears to others to feel and to hold a 
whole circle of theological truths, which exist in his 
mind no otherwise than as a number of deductions. 

Such are some of the lineaments of the ethical char- 
acter, which the cultivated intellect will form, apart 
from religious principle. They are seen within the 



KNOWLEDGE AND BELIGIOUS DUTY 147 

pale of the Church and without it, in holy men, and 
in profligate ; they form the beau-ideal of the world ; 
they partly assist and partly distort the development 
of the Catholic. They may subserve the education of 
a St. Francis de Sales or a Cardinal Pole ; they may 
be the limits of the contemplation of a Shaftesbury or 
a Gibbon. Basil and Julian were fellow students at 
the schools of Athens ; and one became the Saint and 
Doctor of the Church, the other her scoffing and re- 
lentless foe. 



IV 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD IN HIS 

PASSION 

Every passage in the history of our Lord and Sa- 
viour IS of unfathomable depth, and affords inexhaust- 
ible matter of contemplation. All that concerns Him 
is infinite, and what we first discern is but the surface of 
that which begins and ends in eternity. It would be 
presumptuous for any one short of saints and doctors 
to attempt to comment on His words and deeds, ex- 
cept in the way of meditation; but meditation and 
mental prayer are so much a duty in all who wish to 
cherish true faith and love, towards Him, that it mav 
be allowed us, my brethren, under the guidance of holy 
men who have gone before us, to dwell and enlarge 
upon what otherwise would more fitly be adored than 
scrutinised. And certain times of the year, this espe- 
cially,^ call upon us to consider, as closely and minutely 
as we can, even the more sacred portions of the Gospel 
history. I would rather be thought feeble or officious 
in my treatment of them, than wanting to the Season ; 
and so I now proceed because the religious usage of 
the Church requires it, and though any individual 
preacher may well shrink from it, to direct your 
thoughts to a subject, especially suitable now, and 
about which many of us perhaps think very little, the 
sufferings which our Lord endured in His innocent 
and sinless soul. 

* Passion-tide. 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD 149 

You know, my brethren, that our Lord and Saviour, 
though, he was God, was also perfect man ; and hence 
He had not only a body, but a soul likewise, such as 
ours, though pure from all stain of evil. He did not 
take a body without a soul, God forbid ! for that would 
not have been to become man. How would He have 
sanctified our nature by taking a nature which was not 
ours ? Man without a soul is on a level with the beasts 
of the field ; but our Lord came to save a race capable 
of praising and obeying Him, possessed of immortality, 
though that immortality had lost its promised blessed- 
ness. Man was created in the image of God, and that 
image is in his soul ; when then his Maker, by an un- 
speakable condescension, came in his nature. He took 
on Himself a soul in order to take on him a body ; He 
took on Him a soul as the means of His union with a 
body ; He took on Him in the first place the soul, then 
the body of man, both at once, but in this order, the 
soul and the body ; He Himself created the soul which 
He took on Himself, while He took His body from the 
flesh of the Blessed Virgin, His Mother. Thus He 
became perfect man with body and soul ; and as He 
took on Him a body of flesh and nerves, which ad- 
mitted of wounds and death, and was capable of suffer- 
ing, so did He take a soul, too, which was susceptible 
of that suffering, and moreover was susceptible of the 
pain and sorrow which are proper to a human soul ; 
and, as His atoning passion was undergone in the body, 
so it was undergone in the soul also. • 

As the solemn days proceed, we shall be especially 
called on, my brethren, to consider His sufferings in 
the body. His seizure. His forced journeyings to and 
fro, His blows and wounds. His scourging, the crown of 



150 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

thorns, the nails, the Cross. They are all summed up 
in the Crucifix itself, as it meets our eyes ; they are 
represented all at once on His sacred flesh, as it hangs 
up before us — and meditation is made easy by the 
spectacle. It is otherwise with the sufferings of His 
soul ; they cannot be painted for us, nor can they even 
be duly investigated: they- are beyond both sense 
and thought; and yet they anticipated His bodily 
sufferings. The agony, a pain of the soul, not of 
the body, was the first act of His tremendous sacri- 
fice; "My soul is sorrowful even unto death," He 
said ; nay ; if He suffered in the body, it really was 
in the soul, for the body did but convey the infliction 
on to that which was the true recipient and seat of the 
suffering. 

This it is very much to the purpose to insist upon ; 
I say, it was not the body that suffered, but the soul 
in the body ; it was the soul and not the body which 
was the seat of the suffering of the Eternal Word. 
Consider, then, there is no real pain, though there may 
be apparent suffering, when there is no kind of inward 
sensibility or spirit to be the seat of it. A tree, for 
instance, has life, organs, growth, and decay ; it may 
be wounded and injured ; it droops, and is killed ; but 
it does not suffer, because it has no mind or sensible 
principle within it. But wherever this gift of an im- 
material principle is found, there pain is possible, and 
greater pain according to the quality of the gift. Had 
we no spirit of any kind, we should feel as little as a 
tree feels ; had we no soul, we should not feel pain 
more acutely than a brute feels it ; but, being men, 
we feel pain in a way in which none but those who 
have souls can feel it. 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD 151 

Living beings, I say, feel more or less according to the 
spirit which is in them; brutes feel far less than man, 
because they cannot reflect on what they feel ; they 
have no advertence or direct consciousness of their 
sufferings. This it is that makes pain so trying, viz. 
that we cannot help thinking of it, while we suffer it. 
It is before us, it possesses the mind, it keeps our 
thoughts fixed upon it. Whatever draws the mind 
off the thought of it lessens it ; hence friends try to 
amuse us when we are in pain, for amusement is a 
diversion. If the pain is slight, they sometimes suc- 
ceed with us ; and then we are, so to say, without 
pain, even while we suffer. And hence it continually 
happens that in violent exercise or labour, men meet 
with blows or cuts, so considerable and so durable in 
their effect, as to bear witness to the suffering which 
must have attended their infliction, of which never- 
theless they recollect nothing. And in quarrels and in 
battles wounds are received which, from the excite- 
ment of the moment, are brought home to the con- 
sciousness of the combatant, not by the pain at the 
time of receiving them, but by the loss of blood that 
follows. 

I will show you presently, my brethren, how I mean 
to apply what I have said to the consideration of our 
Lord's sufferings ; first I will make another remark. 
Consider, then, that hardly any one stroke of pain is 
intolerable ; it is intolerable when it continues. You 
cry out perhaps that you cannot* bear more ; patients 
feel as if they could stop the surgeon's hand, simply 
because he continues to pain them. Their feeling is 
that they have borne as much as they can bear ; as if 
the continuance and not the intenseness was what 



152 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

made it too much for them. AVhat does this mean, 
but that the memory of the foregoing moments of pain 
acts upon and (as it were) edges the pain that suc- 
ceeds? If the third or fourth or twentieth moment of 
pain could be taken by itself, if the succession of the 
moments that preceded it could be forgotten, it would 
be no more than the first moment, as bearable as the 
first (taking away the shock which accompanies the 
first) ; but what makes it unbearable is, that it is the 
twentieth ; that the first, the second, the third, on to 
the nineteenth moment of pain, are all concentrated 
in the twentieth ; so that every additional moment of 
pain has all the force, the ever-increasing force, of all 
that has preceded it. Hence, I repeat, it is that brute 
animals would seem to feel so little pain, because, that 
is, they have not the power of reflection or of con- 
sciousness. They do not know they exist ; they do not 
^contemplate themselves ; they do not look backwards 
or forwards ; every moment as it succeeds is their all ; 
they wander over the face of the earth, and see this 
thing and that, and feel pleasure and pain, but still 
they take everything as it comes, and then let it go 
again, as men do in dreams. They have memory, but 
not the memory of an intellectual being ; they put to- 
gether nothing, they make nothing properly one and 
individual to themselves out of the particular sensa- 
tions which they receive ; nothing is to them a reality, 
or has a substance, beyond those sensations ; they are 
but sensible of a number of successive impressions. 
And hence, as their other feelings, so their feeling of 
pain is but faint and dull, in spite of their outward 
manifestations of it. It is the intellectual comprehen- 
sion of pain, as a whole diffused through successive 



MENTAL SUFFEBINGS OF OUR LORD 163 

moments, which gives it its special power and keen- 
ness, and it is the soul only, which a brute has not, 
which is capable of that comprehension. 

Now apply this to the sufferings of our Lord ; — do 
you recollect their offering Him wine mingled with 
myrrh, when He was on the point of being crucified ? 
He would not drink of it ; why ? because such a po- 
tion would have stupefied His mind, and He was bent 
on bearing the pain in all its bitterness. You see from 
this, my brethren, the character of His sufferings ; He 
would have fain escaped them, had that been His 
Father's will ; " If it be possible," He said, " let this 
chalice pass from Me ; " but since it was not possible, 
He says calmly and decidedly to the Apostle, who 
would have rescued Him from suffering, " The chalice 
which My Father hath given Me, shall I not drink 
it ? " If He was to suffer. He gave Himself to suffer- 
ing ; He did not come to suffer as little as He could ; 
He did not turn away His face from the suffering ; 
He confronted it, or, as I may say. He breasted it, 
that every particular portion of it might make its due 
impression on Him. And as men are superior to brute 
animals, and are affected by pain more than they, by 
reason of the mind within them, which gives a sub- 
stance to pain, such as it cannot have in the instance 
of brutes ; so, in like manner, our Lord felt pain of 
the body, with an advertence and a consciousness, and 
therefore with a keenness and intensity, and with 
a unity of perception, which none of us can possibly 
fathom or compass, because His soul was so absolutely 
in His power, so simply free from the influence of 
distractions, so fully directed upon the pain, so utterly 
surrendered, so simply subjected to the suffering. And 



154 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

thus He may truly be said to have suffered the whole 
of His passion in every moment of it. 

Recollect that our Blessed Lord was in this respect 
different from us, that, though He was perfect man, 
yet there was a power in Him greater than His soul, 
which ruled His soul, for He was God. The soul of 
other men is subjected to its own wishes, feelings, 
impulses, passions, perturbations ; His soul was sub- 
jected simply to His Eternal and Divine Personality. 
Nothing happened to His soul by chance, or on a 
sudden ; He never was taken by surprise ; nothing 
affected Him without His willing beforehand that it 
should affect Him. Never did He sorrow, or fear, or 
desire, or rejoice in spirit, but He first willed to be 
sorrowful, or afraid, or desirous, or joyful. When we 
suffer, it is because outward agents and the uncontrol- 
lable emotions of our minds bring suffering upon us. 
We are brought under the discipline of pain involun- 
tarily, we suffer from it more or less acutely according 
to accidental circumstances, we find our patience more 
or less tried by it according to our state of mind, and 
we do our best to provide alleviations or remedies of 
it. We cannot anticipate beforehand how much of it 
will come upon us, or how far we shall be able to 
sustain it ; nor can we say afterwards why we have 
felt just what we have felt, or why we did not bear 
the suffering better. It was otherwise* with our Lord. 
His Divine Person was not subject, could not be ex- 
posed, to the influence of His own human affections 
and feelings, except so far as He chose. I repeat, when 
He chose to fear, He feared ; when He chose to be 
angry. He was angry ; when He chose to grieve. He 
was grieved. He was not open to emotion, but He 



MENTAL SUFFEBINGS OF OUR LOED 155 

opened upon Himself voluntarily the impulse by which 
He was moved. Consequently, when He determined 
to suffer the pain of His vicarious passion, whatever 
He did. He did, as the Wise Man says, instanter^ 
" earnestly," with His might ; He did not do it by 
halves ; He did not turn away His mind from the 
suffering as we do — (how should He, who came to 
suffer, who could not have suffered but of His own 
act ?) no, He did not say and unsay, do and undo ; 
He said and He did ; He said, '' Lo, I come to do 
Thy will, O God ; sacrifice and offering Thou would- 
est not, but a body hast Thou fitted to Me." He took 
a body in order that He might suffer ; He became 
man, that He might suffer as man ; and when His 
hour was come, that hour of Satan and of darkness, 
the hour when sin was to pour its full malignity upon 
Him, it followed that He offered HimseK wholly, a 
holocaust, a whole burnt-offering ; — as the whole of 
His body, stretched out upon the Cross, so the whole 
of His soul. His whole advertence. His whole con- 
sciousness, a mind awake, a sense acute, a living co- 
operation, a present, absolute intention, not a virtual 
permission, not a heartless submission, this did He pre- 
sent to His tormentors. His passion was an action ; 
He lived most energetically, while He lay languishing, 
fainting, and dying. Nor did He die, except by an 
act of the will ; for He bowed His head, in command 
as well as in resignation, and said, " Father, into Thy 
hands I commend My Spirit ; " He gave the word, 
He surrendered His soul. He did not lose it. 

Thus you see, my brethren, had our Lord only suf- 
fered in the body, and in it not so much as other men, 
still as regards the pain. He would have really suf- 



156 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

f ered indefinitely more, because pain is to be measured 
by the power of realising it. God was the sufferer ; 
God suffered in His human nature; the sufferings 
belonged to God, and were drunk up, were drained 
out to the bottom of the chalice, because God drank 
them ; not tasted or sipped, not flavoured, disguised 
by human medicaments, as man disposes of the cup of 
anguish. And what I have been saying will further 
serve to answer an objection, which I shall proceed to 
notice, and which perhaps exists latently in the minds 
of many, and leads them to overlook the part which 
our Lord's soul had in His gracious satisfaction for 
sin. 

Our Lord said, when his agony was commencing, 
" My soul is sorrowful unto death ; " now you may 
ask, my brethren, whether He had not certain consola- 
tions peculiar to Himself, impossible in any other, 
which diminished or impeded the distress of His soul, 
and caused Him to feel, not more, but less than an 
ordinary man. For instance. He had a sense of inno- 
cence which no other sufferer could have ; even His 
persecutors, even the false apostle who betrayed Him, 
the judge who sentenced Him, and the soldiers who 
conducted the execution, testified His innocence. " I 
have condemned the innocent blood," said Judas ; " I 
am clear from the blood of this just Person," said 
Pilate ; " Truly this was a just Man," cried the cen- 
turion. And if even they, sinners, bore witness to His 
sinlessness, how much more did His own soul ! And 
we know well that even in our own case, sinners as 
we are, on the consciousness of innocence or of guilt 
mainly turns our power of enduring opposition and 
calumny ; how much more, you will say, in the case of 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUB LOBD 157 

our Lord, did the sense of inward sanctity compensate 
for the suffering and annihilate the shame ! Again, 
you may say that He knew that His sufferings would 
be short, and that their issue would be joyful, whereas 
uncertainty of the future is the keenest element of 
human distress ; but He could not have anxiety, for 
He was not in suspense ; nor despondency or despair, 
for He never was deserted. And in confirmation you 
may refer to St. Paul, who expressly tells us that '' for 
the joy set before Him," our Lord " despised the 
shame." And certainly there is a marvellous calm and 
self-possession in all He does : consider His warning 
to the Apostles, " Watch and pray, lest ye enter into 
temptation ; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh 
is weak ; " or His words to Judas, " Friend, wherefore 
art thou come ? " and, " Judas, betrayest thou the Son 
of Man with a kiss ? " or to Peter, " All that take the 
sword shall perish with the sword ; " or to the man 
who struck Him, " If I have spoken evil, bear wit- 
ness of the evil ; but if well, why smitest thou Me ? " 
or to His Mother, ^* Woman, behold thy Son." 

All this is true and much to be insisted on ; but it 
quite agrees with, or rather illustrates, what I have 
been observing. My brethren, you have only said (to 
use a human phrase) that He was always Himself* 
His mind was its own centre, and was never in the 
slightest degree thrown off its heavenly and most per- 
fect balance. What He suffered. He suffered because 
He put Himself under suffering, and that deliberately 
and calmly. As He said to the leper, ''I will, be thou 
clean ; " and to the paralytic, " Thy sins be forgiven 
thee ; " and to the centurion, " I will come and heal 
him ; " and of Lazarus, " I go to wake him out of 



' 158 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

sleep ; " so He said, " Now I will begin to suffer," 
and He did begin. His composure is but the proof 
how entirely He governed His own mind. He drew 
back, at the proper moment, the bolts and fastenings, 
and opened the gates, and the floods fell right upon 
His soul in all their fulness. That is what St. Mark 
tells us of him ; and he is said to have written his 
Gospels from the very mouth of St. Peter, who was 
one of three witnesses present at the time. " They 
came," he says, " to the place which is called Geth- 
semani ; and He saith to His disciples, Sit you here 
while I pray. And He taketh with Him Peter and 
James and John, and He began to be frightened and 
to be very heavy." You see how deliberately He acts ; 
He comes to a certain spot ; and then, giving the word 
of command, and withdrawing the support of the God- 
head from His soul, distress, terror, and dejection 
at once rush in upon it. Thus He walks forth into 
a mental agony with as definite an action as if it were 
some bodily torture, the fire or the wheel. 

This being the case, you will see at once, my 
brethren, that it is nothing to the purpose to say that 
He would be supported under His trial by the con- 
sciousness of innocence and the anticipation of tri- 
umph ; for His trial consisted in the withdrawal, as 
of other causes of consolation, so of that very con- 
sciousness and anticipation. The same act of the will 
which admitted the influence upon His soul of any 
distress at all, admitted all distresses at once. It was 
not the contest between antagonist impulses and views, 
coming from without, but the operation of an inward 
resolution. As men of self-command can turn from 
one thought to another at their will, so much more 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD 159 

did He deliberately deny Himself the comfort, and 
satiate Himself with the woe. In that moment His 
soul thought not of the future, He thought only of the 
present burden which was upon Him, and which He 
had come upon earth to sustain. 

And now, my brethren, what was it He had to bear, 
when He thus opened upon His soul the torrent of 
this predestinated pain ? Alas ! He had to bear what 
is well known to us, what is familiar to us, but what 
to Him was woe unutterable. He had to bear that 
which is so easy a thing to us, so natural, so welcome, 
that we cannot conceive of it as of a great endurance, 
but which to Him had the scent and the poison of 
death — He had, my dear brethren, to bear the weight 
of sin ; He had to bear your sins ; He had to bear the 
sins of the whole world. Sin is an easy thing to us ; 
we think little of it ; we do not understand how the 
Creator can think much of it ; we cannot bring our 
imagination to believe that it deserves retribution, and, 
when even in this world punishments follow upon it, 
we explain them away or turn our minds from them. 
But consider what sin is in itself ; it is rebellion 
against God ; it is a traitor's act who aims at the over- 
throw and death of His sovereign ; it is that, if I may 
use a strong expression, which, could the Divine Gov- 
ernor of the world cease to be, would be sufficient to 
bring it about. Sin is the mortal enemy of the All- 
holy, so that He and it cannot be together ; and as 
the All-holy drives it from His presence into the outer 
darkness, so, if God could be less than God, it is sin 
that would have power to make Him less. And here 
observe, my brethren, that when once Almighty Love, 
by taking flesh, entered this created system, and 



160 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

submitted Himself to its laws, then fortliwitli this 
antagonist of good and truth, taking advant^-ge of the 
opportunity, flew at that flesh which He had taken, 
and fixed on it, and was its death. The envy of the 
Pharisees, the treachery of Judas, and the madness of 
the people, were but the instrument or the expression 
of the enmity which sin felt towards Eternal Purity as 
soon as, in infinite mercy towards men. He put Him- 
self within its reach. Sin could not touch His Divine 
Majesty ; but it could assail Him in that way in which 
He allowed Himself to be assailed, that is, through 
the medium of His humanity. And in the issue, in 
the death of God incarnate, you are but taught, my 
brethren, what sin is in itself, and what it was which 
then was falling, in its hour and in its strength, upon 
His human nature, when He allowed that nature to 
be so filled with horror and dismay at the very anti- 
cipation. 

There, then, in that most awful hour, knelt the 
Saviour of the world, putting off the defences of His 
divinity, dismissing His reluctant Angels, who in 
myriads were ready at His call, and opening His arms, 
baring His breast, sinless as He was, to the assault 
of His foe, — of a foe whose breath was a pestilence, 
and whose embrace was an agony. There He knelt, 
motionless and still, while the vile and horrible fiend 
clad His spirit in a robe steeped in all that is hateful 
and heinous in human crime, which clung close round 
His heart, and filled His conscience, ^nd found its way 
into every sense and pore of His mind, and spread over 
Him a moral leprosy, till He almost felt Himself to 
be that which He never could be, and which His foe 
would fain have made Him. Oh, the horror, when He 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD 161 

looked, and did not know Himself, and felt as a foul 
and loathsome sinner, from His vivid perception of 
that mass of corruption which poured over His head 
and ran down even to the skirts of His garments ! 
Oh, the distraction, when He found His eyes, and 
hands, and feet, and lips, and heart, as if the members 
of the Evil One, and not of God ! Are these the hands 
of the Immaculate Lamb of God, once innocent, but 
now red with ten thousand barbarous deeds of blood ? 
are these His lips, not uttering prayer, and praise, 
and holy blessings, but as if defiled with oaths, and 
blasphemies, and doctrines of devils ? or His eyes, pro- 
faned as they are by all the evil visions and idolatrous 
fascinations for which men have abandoned their ador- 
able Creator ? And His ears, they ring with sounds 
of revelry and of strife ; and His heart is frozen with 
avarice, and cruelty, and unbelief; and His very 
memory is laden with every sin which has been com- 
mitted since the fall, in all regions of the earth, with 
the pride of the old giants, and the lusts of the five 
cities, and the obduracy of Egypt, and the ambition 
of Babel, and the unthankfulness and scorn of Israel. 
Oh, who does not know the misery of a haunting 
thought which comes again and again, in spite of re- 
jection, to annoy, if it cannot seduce? or of some 
odious and sickening imagination, in no sense one's 
own, but forced upon the mind from without ? or of evil 
knowledge, gained with or without a man's fault, but 
which he would give a great price to be rid of at once 
and for ever ? And adversaries such as these gather 
around Thee, Blessed Lord, in millions now ; they 
come in troops more numerous than the locust or the 
palmer-worm, or the plagues of hail, and flies, and 



162 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

frogs, which were sent against Pharaoh. Of the living 
and of the dead and of the as yet unborn, of the lost 
and of the saved, of Thy people and of strangers, of 
sinners and of saints, all sins are there. Thy dearest 
are there, Thy saints and Thy chosen are upon Thee ; 
Thy three Apostles, Peter, James, and John ; but not 
as comforters, but as accusers, like the friends of Job, 
*' sprinkling dust towards heaven," and heaping curses 
on Thy head. All are there but one ; one only is not 
there, one only ; for she who had no part in sin, she 
only could console Thee, and therefore she is not nigh. 
She will be near Thee on the Cross, she is separated 
from Thee in the garden. She has been Thy companion 
and Thy confidant through Thy life, she interchanged 
with Thee the pure thoughts and holy meditations of 
thirty years ; but her virgin ear may not take in, .nor 
may her immaculate heart conceive, what now is in 
vision before Thee. None was equal to the weight but 
God ; sometimes before Thy saints Thou hast brought 
the image of a single sin, as it appears in the light of 
Thy countenance, or of venial sins, not mortal ; and they 
have told us that the sight did all but kill them, nay, 
would have killed them,'had it not been instantly with- 
drawn. The Mother of God, for all her sanctity, nay, 
by reason of it, could not have borne even one brood 
of that innumerable progeny of Satan which now com- 
passes Thee about. It is the long history of a world, 
and God alone can bear the load of it. Hopes blighted, 
vows broken, lights quenched, warnings scorned, op- 
portunities lost ; the innocent betrayed, the young 
hardened, the penitent relapsing, the just overcome, 
the aged failing ; the sophistry of misbelief, the wilful- 
ness of passion, the obduracy of pride, the tyranny of 



MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUB LORD 163 

habit, the canker o£ remorse, the wasting fever of care, 
the anguish of shame, the pining of disappointment, 
the sickness of despair ; such cruel, such pitiable spec- 
tacles, such heartrending, revolting, detestable, mad- 
dening scenes ; nay, the haggard faces, the convulsed 
lips, the flushed cheek, the dark brow of the willing 
slaves of evil, they are all before Him now ; they are 
upon Him and in Him. They are with Him instead 
of that ineffable peace which has inhabited His soul 
since the moment of His conception. They are upon 
Him, they are all but His own ; He cries to His Father 
as if He were the criminal, not the victim ; His agony 
takes the form of guilt and compunction. He is doing 
penance. He is making confession. He is exercising 
contrition, with a reality and a virtue infinitely greater 
than that of all saints and penitents together ; for He 
is the One Victim for us all, the sole Satisfaction, 
the real Penitent, all but the real sinner. 

He rises languidly from the earth, and turns around 
to meet the traitor and his band, now quickly nearing 
the deep shade. He turns, and lo ! there is blood upon 
His garment and in His footprints. Whence come these 
first-fruits of the passion of the Lamb ? no soldier's 
scourge has touched His shoulders, nor the hangman's 
nails His hands and feet. My brethren. He has bled 
before His time ; He has shed blood ; yes, and it is 
His agonising soul which has broken up His frame- 
work of flesh and poured it forth. His passion has 
begun from within. That tormented Heart, the seat 
of tenderness and love, began at length to labour 
and to beat with vehemence beyond its nature ; " the 
foundations of the great deep were broken up ; " the 
red streams rushed forth so copious and fierce as to 



164 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

overflow the veins, and bursting through the pores, 
they stood in a thick dew over His whole skin ; then 
forming into drops, they rolled down full and heavy, 
and drenched the ground. 

" My soul is sorrowful even unto death," He said. 
It has been said of that dreadful pestilence which now 
is upon us, that it begins with death ; by which is meant 
that it has no stage or crisis, that hope is over when 
it comes, and that what looks like its course is but the 
death agony and the process of dissolution ; and thus 
our Atoning Sacrifice, in a much higher sense, began 
with this passion of woe, and only did not die, because 
at His Omnipotent will His Heart did not break, nor 
Soul separate from Body, till He had suffered on the 
Cross. 

No; He has not yet exhausted that full chalice, 
from which at first His natural infirmity shrank. The 
seizure and the arraignment, and the buffeting, and 
the prison, and the trial, and the mocking, and the 
passing to and fro, and the scourging, and the crown 
of thorns, and the slow march to Calvary, and the 
crucifixion, these are all to come. A night and a day, 
hour after hour, is slowly to run out before the end 
comes, and the satisfaction is completed. 

And then, when the appointed moment arrived, and 
He gave the word, as His passion had begun with His 
soul, with the soul did it end. He did not die of bodily 
exhaustion, or of bodily pain ; at His will His tor- 
mented Heart broke, and He commended His Spirit 
to the Father. 
• ••••••••• 

" O Heart of Jesus, all Love, I offer Thee these 
humble prayers for myself, and for all those who unite 



PURITY AND LOVE 165 

themselves with me in Spirit to adore Thee. O holiest 
Heart of Jesus most lovely, I intend to renew and to 
offer to Thee these acts of adoration and these 
prayers, for myself a wretched sinner, and for all those 
who are associated with me in Thy adoration, through 
all moments while I breathe, even to the end of my 
life. I recommend to Thee, O my Jesus, Holy Church, 
Thy dear spouse and our true Mother, all just souls 
and all poor sinners, the afflicted, the dying, and all 
mankind. Let not Thy Blood be shed for them in 
vain. Finally, deign to apply it in relief of the souls 
in Purgatory, of those in particular who have practised 
in the course of their life this holy devotion of adoring 
Thee." 



PURITY AND LOVE 

We find two especial manifestations of divine grace 
in the human heart, whether we turn to Scripture for 
instances of it, or to the history of the Church; 
whether we trace it in the case of Saints, or in persons 
of holy and religious life ; and the two are even found 
among our Lord's Apostles, being represented by the 
two foremost of that favoured company, St. Peter and 
St. John. St. John is the Saint of purity, and St. 
Peter is the Saint of love. Not that love and purity 
can ever be separated ; not as if a Saint had not all 
virtues in him at once ; not as if St. Peter were not 
pure as well as loving, and St. John loving, for all he 
was so pure. The graces of the Spirit cannot be sepa- 
rated from each other ; one implies the rest ; what is 
love but a delight in God, a devotion to Him, a surren- 



166 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

der of the whole self to Him ? what is impurity, on 
the other hand, but the turning to something of this 
world, something sinful, as the object of our affections 
instead of God ? What is it but a deliberate aban- 
donment of the Creator for the creature, and seeking 
pleasure in the shadow of death, not in the all-blissful 
Presence of light and holiness? The impure then can- 
not love God ; and those who are without love of God 
cannot really be pure. Purity prepares the soul for 
love and love confirms the soul in purity. The flame 
of love will not be bright unless the substance which 
feeds it be pure and unadulterate ; and the most daz- 
zling purity is but as iciness and desolation unless it 
draws its life from fervent love. 

Yet, certain as this is, it is certain also that the 
spiritual works of God show differently from each 
other to our eyes, and that they display, in their char- 
acter and their history, some of them this virtue more 
than other virtues, and some that. In other words, it 
pleases the Giver of grace to endue His Saints spe- 
cially with certain gifts, for His glory, which light 
up and beautify one particular portion or depart- 
ment of their souls, so as to cast their other excel- 
lences into the shade. And then this special gift of 
grace becomes their characteristic, and we put it first 
in our thoughts of them, and consider what they have 
besides as included in it, or dependent upon it, and 
speak of them as if they had not the rest, though we 
know they really have them ; and we give them some 
title or description taken from that particular grace 
which is so emphatically theirs. And in this way we 
may speak, as 1 intend to do in what I am going to 
say, of two chief classes of Saints, whose emblems 



PURITY AND LOVE 167 

are the lily and the rose, who are bright with angelic 
purity or who burn with divine love. 

The two St. Johns are the great instances of the 
Angelic life. Whom, my brethren, can we conceive 
to have such majestic and severe sanctity as the Holy 
Baptist ? He had a privilege which reached near upon 
the prerogative of the Most Blessed Mother of God ; 
for, if she was conceived without sin, at least without 
sin he was born. She was all-pure, all-holy, and sin had 
no part in her : but St. John was in the beginning of 
his existence a partaker of Adam's curse ; he lay under 
God's wrath, deprived of that grace which Adam had 
received, and which is the life and strength of human 
nature. Yet, as soon as Christ, his Lord and Saviour, 
came to him, and Mary saluted his own mother, 
Elizabeth, forthwith the grace of God was given to 
him, and the original guilt was wiped away from his 
soul. And therefore it is that we celebrate the nativity 
of St. John ; nothing unholy does the Church celebrate ; 
not St. Peter's birth, nor St. Paul's, nor St. Augustine's, 
nor St. Gregory's, nor St. Bernard's, nor St. Aloysius's, 
nor the nativity of any other Saint, however glorious, 
because they were all born in sin. She celebrates their 
conversions, their prerogatives, their martyrdoms, their 
deaths, their translations, but not their birth, because 
in no case was it holy. Three nativities alone does she 
commemorate, our Lord's, His Mother's, and lastly, 
St. John's. What a special gift was this, my brethren, 
separating the Baptist off, and distinguishing him from 
all prophets and preachers, who ever lived, however 
holy, except perhaps the prophet Jeremias ! And such 
as was his commencement, was the course of his life. 
He was carried away by the Spirit into the desert, and 



168 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

there he lived on the simplest fare, in the rudest 
clothing, in the caves of wild beasts, apart from men, 
for thirty years, leading a life of mortification and of 
prayer, till he was called to preach penance, to pro- 
claim the Christ, and to baptize Him ; and then hav- 
ing done his work, and having left no act of sin on 
record, he was laid aside as an instrument which had 
lost its use, and languished in prison, till he was sud- 
denly cut off by the sword of the executioner. Sanc- 
tity is the one idea of him impressed upon us from 
first to last ; a most marvellous Saint, a hermit from 
his childhood, then a preacher to a fallen people, and 
then a Martyr. Surely such a life fulfils that expecta- 
tion concerning him that follows on Mary's salutation 
of his mother before his birth. 

Yet still more beautiful, and almost as majestic, is 
the image of his namesake, that great Apostle, Evan- 
gelist, and Prophet of the Church, who came so early 
into our Lord's chosen company, and lived so long 
after all his fellows. We can contemplate him in his 
youth and in his venerable age ; and on his whole life, 
from first to last, as his special gift, is marked purity. 
He is the virgin Apostle, who on that account was so 
dear to his Lord, " the disciple whom Jesus loved," 
who lay on His Bosom, who received His Mother from 
Him when upon the Cross, who had the vision of all 
the wonders which were to come to pass in the world 
to the end of time. " Greatly to be honoured," says 
the Church, " is blessed John, who on the Lord's 
Breast lay at supper, to whom, a virgin, did Christ on 
the Cross commit his Virgin Mother. He was chosen 
a virgin by the Lord, and was more beloved than the 
rest. The special prerogative of chastity had made 



PUEITY AND LOVE 169 

him meet for his Lord's larger love, because, being 
chosen by Him a virgin, a virgin he remained unto 
the end." He it was who in his youth professed his 
readiness to drink Christ's chalice with Him ; who 
wore away a long life as a desolate stranger in a 
foreign land ; who was at length carried to Rome and 
plunged into the hot oil, and then was banished to 
a far island, till his days drew near their close. 

O how impossible it is worthily to conceive of the 
sanctity of these two great servants of God, so dif- 
ferent is their whole history, in their lives and in their 
deaths, yet agreeing together in their seclusion from 
the world, in their tranquillity, and in their ^ all but 
sinlessness ! Mortal sin had never touched them, and 
we may well believe that even from deliberate venial 
sin they were ever exempt; nay, that at particular 
seasons or on certain occasions they did not sin at all. 
The rebellion of the reason, the waywardness of the 
feelings, the disorder of the thoughts, the fever of 
passion, the treachery of the senses, these evils did the 
all-powerful grace of God subdue in them. They 
lived in a world of their own, uniform, serene, abiding ; 
in visions of peace, in communion with heaven, in 
anticipation of glory ; and, if they spoke to the world 
without, as preachers or as confessors, they spoke as 
from some sacred shrine, not mixing with men while 
they addressed them, as " a voice crying in the wilder- 
ness " or " in the Spirit on the Lord's Day." And 
therefore it is we speak of them rather as patterns of 
sanctity than of love, because love regards an external 
object, runs towards it and labours for it, whereas 
such Saints came so close to the Object of their love, 
they were granted so to receive Him into their breasts, 



170 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

and so to make themselves one with Him, that their 
hearts did not so much love heaven as were them- 
selves a heaven, did not so much see light as were 
light ; and they lived among men as those Angels in 
the old time, who came to the patriarchs and spake 
as though they were God, for God was in them, and 
spake by them. Thus these two were almost absorbed 
in the Godhead, living an angelical life, as far as man 
could lead one, so calm, so still, so raised above sorrow 
and fear, disappointment and regret, desire and aver- 
sion, as to be the most perfect images that earth has 
seen of the peace and immutability of God. Such 
too are the many virgin Saints whom history records 
for our veneration, St. Joseph, the great St. Antony, 
St. Cecilia who was waited on by Angels, St. Nicolas 
of Bari, St. Peter Celestine, St. Rose of Viterbo, St. 
Catharine of Sienna, and a host of others, and above 
all, the Virgin of Virgins, and Queen of Virgins, the 
Blessed Mary, who, though replete and overflowing 
with the grace of love, yet for the very reason that 
she was the " seat of wisdom," and the " ark of the 
covenant," is more commonly represented imder the 
emblem of the lily than of the rose. 

But now, my brethren, let us turn to the other 
class of Saints. I have been speaking of those who in 
a wonderful, sometimes in a miraculous way, have 
been defended from sin, and conducted from strength 
to strength, from youth till death ; but now suppose 
it has been the will of God to shed the light and 
power of His Spirit upon those who have misused the 
talents, and quenched the grace already given them, 
and who therefore have a host of evils within them of 
which they are to be dispossessed ; who are under the 



PUBITY AND LOVE 171 

dominion of obstinate habits, indulged passions, false 
opinions ; who have served Satan, not as infants 
before their baptism, but with their will, with their 
reason, with their faculties responsible, and their hearts 
alive and conscious. Is He to draw these elect souls 
to Him without themselves, or by means of them- 
selves? Is He to change them at His word, as He 
created them, as He wiU make them die, as He will 
raise them from the grave, or is He to enter into their 
souls, to address Himself to them, to persuade them, 
and so to win them? Doubtless He might have been 
urgent with them, and masterful; He might by a 
blessed violence have come upon them, and so turned 
them into Saints; He might have superseded any 
process of conversion, and out of the very stones have 
raised up children to Abraham. But He has wiUed 
otherwise ; else, why did He manifest Himself on 
earth ? Why did He surround Himself on His coming 
with so much that was touching and attractive and 
subduing? Why did He bid His angels proclaim 
that He was to be seen as a little infant, in a manger 
and in a Virgin's bosom, at Bethlehem ? Why did He 
go about doing good ? Why did He die in public, 
before the world, with His Mother and His beloved 
disciple by Him ? Why does He now tell us how He 
is exalted in Heaven with a host of glorified Saints, 
who are our intercessors, about His throne ? Why does 
He give us His own Mother Mary for our mother, the 
most perfect image after Himself of what is beautiful 
and tender, and gentle and soothing, in human nature ? 
Why does He manifest Himself by an ineffable con- 
descension on our Altars, still humbling HimseK, 
though He reigns on high ? What does all this show, 



172 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

but that, when souls wander away from Him, He re- 
claims them by means of themselves, " by cords of 
Adam," or of human nature, as the prophet speaks, — 
conquering us indeed at His will, saving us in spite of 
ourselves, — and yet by ourselves, so that the very 
reason and affections of the old Adam, which have 
been made " the instruments of iniquity unto sin," 
should, under the power of His grace, become " the 
instruments of justice unto God " ? 

Yes, doubtless He draws us " by cords of Adam," 
and what are those cords, but, as the prophet speaks 
in the same verse, "the cords," or " the twine of love"? 
It is the manifestation of the glory of God in the Face 
of Jesus Christ ; it is that view of the attributes and 
perfections of Almighty God ; it is the beauty of His 
sanctity, the sweetness of His mercy, the brightness 
of His heaven, the majesty of His law, the harmony 
of His providences, the thrilling music of His voice, 
which is the antagonist of the flesh, and the soul's 
champion against the world and the devil. " Thou 
hast seduced me, O Lord," says the prophet, " and I 
was seduced; Thou art stronger than I, and hast pre- 
vailed ;" Thou hast thrown Thy net skilfully, and its 
subtle threads are entwined round each affection of my 
heart, and its meshes have been a power of God, " bring- 
ing into captivity the whole intellect to the service of 
Christ." If the world has its fascinations, so surely 
has the Altar of the living God; if its pomps and 
vanities dazzle, so much more should the vision of 
Angels ascending and descending on the heavenly 
ladder ; if sights of earth intoxicate, and its music is 
a spell upon the soul, behold Mary pleads with us, over 
against them, with her chaste eyes, and offers the 



PURITY AND LOVE 173 

Eternal Child for our caress, while sounds of cherubim 
are heard aU round singing from out the fulness of the 
Divine Glory. Has divine hope no emotion? Has 
divine charity no transport? "How dear are Thy 
tabernacles, O Lord of hosts ! " says the prophet ; " my 
soul doth lust, and doth faint for the courts of the Lord ; 
my heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God. 
Better is one day in Thy courts above a thousand : 
I have chosen to be an abject in the house of my 
God, rather than to dwell in the tabernacles of sin- 



ners." 



So is it, as a great Doctor and penitent has said, St. 
Augustine ; " It is not enough to be drawn by the will ; 
thou art also drawn by the sense of pleasure. What 
is to be drawn by pleasure ? ' Delight thou in the 
Lord, and He will give thee the petitions of thy heart.' 
There is a certain pleasure of heart, when that heavenly 
Bread is sweet to a man. Moreover, if the poet saith, 
^ Every one is drawn by his own pleasure,' not by 
necessity, but by pleasure; not by obligation, but by 
delight ; how much more boldly ought we to say, that 
man is drawn to Christ, when he is delighted with 
truth, delighted with bliss, delighted with justice, de- 
lighted with eternal life, all which is Christ? Have 
the bodily senses their pleasures, and is the mind with- 
out its own? If so, whence is it said, 'The sons of 
men shall hope under the covering of Thy wings ; they 
shall be intoxicate with the richness of Thy house, 
and with the torrent of Thy pleasure shalt Thou give 
them to drink : for with Thee is the well of life, and 
in Thy light we shall see light ' ? 'He, whom the 
Father draweth, cometh to Me,'" he continues; 
"Whom hath the Father drawn? him who said, 



174 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

' Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God.' You 
present a green branch to the sheep, and you draw it 
forward; fruits are offered to the child, and he is drawn ; 
in that he runs, he is drawn, he is drawn by loving, 
drawn without bodily hurt, drawn by the bond of the 
heart. If then it be true that the sight of earthly 
delight draws on the lover, doth not Christ too draw 
us when revealed by the Father ? For what doth the 
soul desire more strongly than truth?" 

Such are the means which God has provided for the 
creation of the Saint out of the sinner ; He takes him 
as he is, and uses him against himself : He turns his 
affections into another channel, and extinguishes a 
carnal love by infusing a heavenly charity. Not as 
if He used him as a mere irrational creature, who is 
impelled by instincts and governed by external incite- 
ments without any will of his own, and to whom one 
pleasure is the same as another, the same in kind, 
though different in degree. I have already said, it is 
the very triumph of His grace, that He enters into the 
heart of man, and persuades it, and prevails with it, 
while He changes it. He violates in nothing that 
original constitution of mind which He gave to man : 
He treats him as man ; He leaves him the liberty of 
acting this way or that ; He appeals to all his powers 
and faculties, to his reason, to his prudence, to his 
moral sense, to his conscience : He rouses his fears 
as well as his love ; He instructs him in the depravity 
of sin, as well as in the mercy of God ; but still, on 
the whole, the animating principle of the new life, by 
which it is both kindled and sustained, is the flame 
of charity. This only is strong enough to destroy the 
old Adam, to dissolve the tyranny of habit, to quench 



FUEITY AND LOVE 175 

the fires of concupiscence, and to burn up the strong- 
holds of pride. 

And hence it is that love is presented to us as the 
distinguishing grace of those who were sinners before 
they were Saints ; not that love is not the life of all 
Saints, of those who have never needed a conversion, 
of the Most Blessed Virgin, of the two St. John's, and 
of those others, many in number, who are " first-fruits 
unto God and the Lamb ; " but that, while in those 
who have never sinned gravely love is so contemplative 
as almost to resolve itself into the sanctity of God 
Himself ; in those, on the contrary, in whom it dwells 
as a principle of recovery, it is so full of devotion, of 
zeal, of activity, and good works, that it gives a visible 
character to their history, and is ever associating itself 
with our thoughts of them. 

Such was the great Apostle, on whom the Church 
is built, and whom I contrasted, when I began, with 
his fellow- Apostle St. John : whether we contemplate 
him after his first calling, or on his repentance, he who 
denied his Lord, out of all the Apostles, is the most 
conspicuous for his love of Him. It was for this love 
of Christ, flowing on, as it did, from its impetuosity 
and exuberance, into love of the brethren, that he was 
chosen to be the chief Pastor of the fold. " Simon, 
son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?" was 
the trial put on him by his Lord ; and the reward was, 
" Feed My lambs, feed My sheep." Wonderful to 
say, the Apostle whom Jesus loved, was yet surpassed 
in love for Jesus by a brother Apostle, not virginal as 
he ; for it is not John of whom our Lord asked this 
question, and who was rewarded with this commission, 
but Peter. 



178 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Look back at an earlier passage of the same narrar 
tive ; there, too, the two Apostles are similarly con- 
trasted in their respective characters ; for when they 
were in the boat, and their Lord spoke to them from 
the shore, and " they knew not that it was Jesus," first 
*' that disciple, whom Jesus loved, said to Peter, It is 
the Lord," for " the clean of heart shall see God ; " 
and then at once '' Simon Peter," in the impetuosity 
of his love, " girt his tunic about him, and cast him- 
self into the sea," to reach Him the quicker. St. 
John beholds and St. Peter acts. 

Thus the very presence of Jesus enkindled Peter's 
heart, and at once drew him unto Him ; also at a 
former time, when he saw his Lord walking on the 
sea, his very first impulse was, as in the passage to 
which I have been referring, to leave the vessel and 
hasten to His side : " Lord, if it be Thou, bid me come 
to Thee upon the waters." And when he had been 
betrayed into his great sin, the very Eye of Jesus 
brought him to himself : " And the Lord turned and 
looked upon Peter ; and Peter remembered the word 
of the Lord, and he went out and wept bitterly." 
Hence, on another occasion, when many of the dis- 
ciples fell away, and " Jesus said to the twelve. Do 
you too wish to go away? " St. Peter answered, 
" Lord, to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words 
of eternal life ; and we have believed and have known 
that Thou art Christ, the Son of God." 

Such, too, was that other great Apostle, who, in so 
many ways, is associated with St. Peter — the Doctor 
of the Gentiles. He indeed was converted miracu- 
lously, by our Lord's appearing to him, when he 
was on his way to carry death to the Christians of 



PUEITY AND LOVE 111 

Damascus : but how does lie speak ? " Whether we 

are beside ourselves," he says, " it is to God ; or 

whether we be sober, it is for you : for the charity of 

Christ constraineth us. If, therefore, any be a new 

creature in Christ, old things have passed away, 

behold all things are made new." And so again : 

" With Christ am I nailed to the cross ; but I live, 

yet no longer I, but Christ liveth in me ; and the life 

I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of 

God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me." And 

again : " I am the least of the Apostles, who am not 

worthy to be called an Apostle, because I persecuted 

the Church of God. But by the grace of God I am 

what I am ; and His grace in me hath not been void, 

but I laboured more abundantly than they all, yet not 

I, but the grace of God with me." And once more : 

" Whether we live, unto the Lord we live ; whether 

we die, unto the Lord we die; whether we live or 

whether we die, we are the Lord's." You see, my 

brethren, the character of St. Paul's love ; it was a 

love fervent, eager, energetic, active, full of great 

works, "strong as death," as the inspired Word says, 

a flame which " many waters could not quench, nor 

the streams drown," which lasted to the end, when he 

could say, " I have fought the good fight, I have 

finished the course, I have kept the faith ; henceforth 

is laid up for me the crown of justice, which the Lord 

will render to me at that day, the just Judge." 

And there is a third, my brethren, there is an illus- 
trious third in Scripture, whom we must associate 
with these two great Apostles, when we speak of the 
saints of penance and love. Who is it but the loving 
Magdalen ? Who is it so fully instances what I am 



178 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

showing, as "the woman who was a sinner," who 
watered the Lord's feet with her tears, and dried them 
with her hair, and anointed them with precious oint- 
ment ? What a time for such an act ! She, who had 
come into the room, as if for a festive purpose, to go 
about an act of penance ! It was a formal banquet, 
given by a rich Pharisee, to honour, yet to try, our 
Lord. Magdalen came, young and beautiful, and 
" rejoicing in her youth," " walking in the ways of 
her heart and the gaze of her eyes : " she came as if 
to honour that feast, as women were wont to honour 
such festive doings, with her sweet odours and cool 
unguents for the forehead and hair of the guests. And 
he, the proud Pharisee, suffered her to come,' so that 
she touched not him ; let her come as we might suffer 
inferior animals to enter our apartments, without 
caring for them ; perhaps suffered her as a necessary 
embellishment of the entertainment, yet as having no 
soul, or as destined to perdition, but anyhow as nothing 
to him. He, proud being, and his brethren like him, 
might " compass sea and land to make one proselyte ; " 
but, as to looking into that proselyte's heart, pitying 
its sin, and trying to heal it, this did not enter into 
the circuit of his thoughts. No, he thought only of 
the necessities of his banquet, and he let her come to 
do her part, such as it was, careless what her life was, 
so that she did that part well, and confined herself to 
it. But, lo, a wondrous sight ! was it a sudden in- 
spiration, or a mature resolve ? was it an act of the 
moment, or the result of a long conflict ? — but behold, 
that poor, many-coloured child of guilt approaches 
to crown with her sweet ointment the head of Him to 
whom the feast was given; and see, she has stayed 



PUEITY AND LOVE 179 

her hand. She has looked, and she discerns the Im- 
maculate, the Virgm's Son, " the brightness of the 
Eternal Light, and the spotless mirror of God's maj- 
esty." She looks, and she recognizes the Ancient of 
Days, the Lord of life and death, her Judge; and 
again she looks, and she sees in His face and in His 
mien a beauty, and a sweetness, awful, serene, majestic, 
more than that of the sons of men, which paled all 
the splendour of that festive room. Again she looks, 
timidly yet eagerly, and she discerns in His eye, and 
in His smile, the loving-kindness, the tenderness, the 
compassion, the mercy of the Saviour of man. She 
looks at herself, and oh ! how vile, how hideous is she, 
who but now was so vain of her attractions ! — how 
withered is that comeliness, of which the praises ran 
through the mouths of her admirers ! — how loathsome 
has become the breath, which hitherto she thought so 
fragrant, savouring only of those seven bad spirits 
which dwell within her ! And there she would have 
stayed, there she would have sunk on the earth, 
wrapped in her confusion and in her despair, had she 
not cast one glance again on that all-loving, all-for- 
giving Countenance. He is looking at her : it is the 
Shepherd looking at the lost sheep, and the lost sheep 
surrenders herself to Him. He speaks not, but He 
eyes her ; and she draws nearer to Him. Rejoice, ye 
Angels, she draws near, seeing nothing but Him, and 
caring neither for the scorn of the proud, nor the jests 
of the profligate. She draws near, not knowing whether 
she shall be saved or not, not knowing whether she 
shall be received, or what will become of her; this 
only knowing that He is the Foimt of holiness and 
truth, as of mercy, and to whom should she go, but to 



180 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Him who hath the words of eternal life ? " Destruction 
is thine own, O Israel ; in Me only is thy help. Re- 
turn unto Me, and I will not turn away My face from 
thee : for I am holy, and will not be angry for ever." 
'' Behold we come unto thee ; for Thou art the Lord 
our God. Truly the hills are false, and the multitude 
of the mountains : Truly the Lord our God is the 
salvation of Israel." Wonderful meeting between 
what was most base and what is most pure ! Those 
wanton hands, those polluted lips, have touched, have 
kissed the feet of the Eternal, and He shrank not from 
the homage. And as she hung over them, and as she 
moistened them from her full eyes, how did her love 
for One so great, yet so gentle, wax vehement within 
her, lighting up a flame which never was to die from 
that moment even for ever! and what excess did it 
reach, when He recorded before all men her forgive- 
ness, and the cause of it ! " Many sins are forgiven 
her, for she loved much ; but to whom less is forgiven, 
the same loveth less. And He said unto her, Thy sins 
are forgiven thee ; thy faith hath made thee safe, go 
in peace." 

Henceforth, my brethren, love was to her, as to 
St. Augustine and to St. Ignatius Loyola afterwards, 
(great penitents in their own time,) as a wound in the 
soul, so full of desire as to become anguish. She 
could not live out of the presence of Him in whom 
her joy lay: her spirit languished after Him, when 
she saw Him not ; and waited on Him silently, 
reverently, wistfully, when she was in His blissful 
Presence. We read of her (if it was she) on one occa- 
sion, sitting at His feet to hear His words, and of His 
testifying that she had chosen that best part which 



PURITY AND LOVE 181 

should not be taken away from her. And, after His 
resurrection, she, by her perseverance, merited to see 
Him even before the Apostles. She would not leave 
the sepulchre, when Peter and John retired, but stood 
without, weeping ; and when the Lord appeared to her, 
and held her eyes that she should not know Him, she 
said piteously to the supposed keeper of the garden, 
" Tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take 
Him away." And when at length He made Himself 
known to her, she turned herself, and rushed im- 
petuously to embrace His feet, as at the beginning, 
but He, as if to prove the dutifulness of her love, 
forbade her : " Touch Me not," He said, " for I have 
not yet ascended to My Father ; but go to my brethren 
and say to them, I ascend to my Father and your 
Father, to my God and your God." And so she was 
left to long for the time when she should see Him, and 
hear His voice, and enjoy His smile, and be allowed to 
minister to Him, for ever in heaven. 

Such then is the second great class of Saints, as 
viewed in contrast with the first. Love is the life 
of both : but while the love of the innocent is calm 
and serene, the love of the penitent is ardent and im- 
petuous, commonly engaged in contest with the world, 
and active in good works. And this is the love which 
you, my brethren, must have in your measure, if you 
would have a good hope of salvation. For you were 
once sinners ; either by open and avowed contempt of 
religion, or by secret transgression, or by carelessness 
and coldness, or by some indulged bad habit, or by 
setting your heart on sotne object of this world, and 
doing your own will instead of God's, I think I m^j 
say you have needed, or now need, a reconciliation to 



182 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Him. You have needed, or you need, to be brought 
near to Him, and to have your sins washed away in 
His blood, and your pardon recorded in Heaven. And 
what will do this for you, but contrition? and what is 
contrition without love ? I do not say that you must 
have the love which Saints have, in order to your for- 
giveness, the love of St. Peter or of St. Mary Magdalen ; 
but still without your portion of that same heavenly^ 
grace, how can you be forgiven at all ? If you would 
do works meet for penance, they must proceed from 
a living flame of charity. If you would secure perse- 
verance to the end, you must gain it by continual loving 
prayer to the Author and Finisher of faith and obedi- 
ence. If you would have a good prospect of His 
acceptance of you in your last moments, still it is love 
alone which secures His love, and blots out sin. My 
brethren, at that awful hour you may be unable to 
obtain the last Sacraments ; death may come on you 
suddenly, or you may be at a distance from a Priest. 
You may be thrown on yourselves, simply on your own 
compunction of heart, your own repentance, your own 
resolutions of amendment. You may have been weeks 
and weeks at a distance from spiritual aid ; you may 
have to meet your God without the safeguard, the 
compensation, the mediation of any holy rite; and 
oh ! what wiU save you at such disadvantage, but the 
exercise of divine love " poured over your hearts by 
the Holy Ghost who is given to you"? At that hour 
nothing but a firm habit of charity, which has kept 
you from mortal sins, or a powerful act of charity 
which blots them out, will be of any avail to you. 
Nothing but charity can enable you to live weU or to 
die well. How can you bear to lie down at night, how 



PURITY AND LOVE 183 

can you bear to go a journey, how can you bear the 
presience of pestilence, or the attack of ever so slight 
an indisposition, if you are ill provided in yourselves 
with divine love against that change, which will come 
on you some day, yet when and how you know not ? 
Alas! how will you present yourselves before the 
judgment-seat of Christ, with the imperfect mixed 
feelings which now satisfy you, with a certain amount 
of faith, and trust, and fear of God's judgments, but 
with nothing of that real delight in Him, in His 
attributes, in His will, in His commandments, in His 
service, which Saints possess in such fulness, and 
which alone can give the soul a comfortable title to 
the merits of His death and passion ? 

How different is the feeling with which the loving 
soul, on its separation from the body, approaches the 
judgment-seat of its Redeemer ! It knows how great 
a debt of punishment remains upon it, though it has 
for many years been reconciled to Him ; it knows that 
purgatory lies before it, and that the best it can rea- 
sonably hope for is to be sent there. But to see His 
face, though for a moment ! to hear His voice, to hear 
Him speak, though it be to punish ! O Saviour of men, 
it says, I come to Thee, though it be in order to be at 
once remanded from Thee; I come to Thee who art 
my Life and my All ; I come to Thee on the thought 
of whom I have lived all my life long. To Thee I 
gave myself when first I had to take a part in the 
world ; I sought Thee for my chief good early, for 
early didst Thou teach me, that good elsewhere there 
was none. Whom have I in heaven but Thee ? whom 
have I desired on earth, whom have I had on earth, 
but Thee ? whom shall I have amid the sharp flame 



184 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

but Thee ? Yea, though I be now descending thither, 
into " a land desert, pathless and without water," I 
will fear no ill, for Thou art with me. I have seen 
Thee this day face to face, and it sufficeth ; I have 
seen Thee, and that glance of Thine is sufficient for 
a century of sorrow, in the nether prison. I will live 
on that look of Thine, though I see Thee not, till I see 
Thee again, never to part from Thee. That eye of 
Thine shall be sunshine and comfort to my weary, 
longing soul ; that voice of Thine shall be everlasting 
music in my ears. Nothing can harm me, nothing 
shall discompose me : I will bear the appointed years, 
till the end comes, bravely and sweetly. I will raise 
my voice, and chant a perpetual Confiteor to Thee and 
to Thy Saints in that dreary valley; — "to God Omni- 
potent, and to the Blessed Mary Ever- Virgin," (Thy 
Mother and mine, immaculate in her conception,) 
" and to blessed Michael Archangel," (created in his 
purity by the very hand of God,) and '' to Blessed 
John Baptist," (sanctified even in his mother's womb;) 
and after these three, "to the Holy Apostles Peter 
and Paul," (penitents, who compassionate the sinner 
from their experience of sin;) "to all Saints," (whether 
they have lived in contemplation or in toil, during the 
days of their pilgrimage,) to all Saints will I address 
my supplication, that they may *' remember me, since 
it is well with them, and do mercy by me, and make 
mention of me unto the King that He bring me out 
of prison." And then at length "God shall wipe away 
every tear from my eyes, and death shall be no longer, 
nor mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the 
former things are passed away." 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 185 

THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE, THE 
RELIGION OF MANKIND 

(Preached in the University Church, Dublin) 

EvANG. SEC. Luc, c. xviii, V. 13 

Deus, propitius esto mihi peccatori. 
O God, be merciful to me, a sinner. 

These words set before us what may be called the 
characteristic mark of the Christian Religion, as con- 
trasted with the various forms of worship and schools 
of belief, which in early or in later times have spread 
over the earth. They are a confession of sin and a 
prayer for mercy. Not indeed that the notion of trans- 
gression and of forgiveness was introduced by Chris- 
tianity, and is unknown beyond its pale ; on the 
contrary, most observable it is, the symbols of guilt 
and pollution, and rites of deprecation and expiation, 
are more or less common to them all ; but what is 
peculiar to our divine faith, as to Judaism before it, is 
this, that confession of sin enters into the idea of its 
highest saintliness, and that its pattern worshippers 
and the very heroes of its history are only, and can 
only be, and cherish in their hearts the everlasting 
memory that they are, and carry with them into heaven 
the rapturous avowal of their being redeemed, restored 
transgressors. Such an avowal is not simply wrung 
from the lips of the neophyte, or of the lapsed ; it is 
not the cry of the common run of men alone, who are 
buffeting with the surge of temptation in the wide 
world ; it is the hymn of saints, it is the trium_phant 
ode sounding from the heavenly harps of the Blessed 



186 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

before the Throne, who sing to their Divine Redeemer, 
''Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God in 
Thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, 
and nation." 

And what is to the Saints above a theme of never- 
ending thankfulness, is, while they are yet on earth, 
the matter of their perpetual humiliation. Whatever 
be their advance in the spiritual life, they never rise 
from their knees, they never cease to beat their breasts, 
as if sin could possibly be strange to them while they 
were in the flesh. Even our Lord Himself, the very 
Son of God in human nature, and infinitely separate 
from sin, — even His Immaculate Mother, encompassed 
by His grace from the first beginnings of her existence, 
and without any part of the original stain, — even they, 
as descended from Adam, were subjected at least to 
death, the direct, emphatic punishment of sin. And 
much more, even the most favoured of that glorious 
company, whom He has washed clean in His Blood ; 
they never forget what they were by birth ; they con- 
fess, one and all, that they are children of Adam, and 
of the same nature as their brethren, and compassed 
with infirmities while in the flesh, whatever may be 
the grace given them and their own improvement of 
it. Others may look up to them, but they ever look 
up to God ; others may speak of their merits, but they 
only speak of their defects. The young and unspotted, 
the aged and most mature, he who has sinned least, he 
who has repented most, the fresh innocent brow, and 
the hoary head, they unite in this one litany, " O God, 
be merciful to me, a sinner." So it was with St. Aloy- 
sius ; so, on the other hand, was it with St. Ignatius ; 
so was it with St. Rose, the youngest of the saints, who. 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 187 

as a child, submitted her tender frame to the most 
amazing penances ; so was it with St. Philip Neri, one 
of the most aged, who, when some one praised him, 
cried out, " Begone, I am a devil, and not a saint ; " 
and when going to communicate, would protest before 
his Lord, that he " was good for nothing, but to do 
evil." Such utter self-prostration, I say, is the very- 
badge and token of the servant of Christ ; — and this 
indeed is conveyed in His own words, when He says, 
" I am not come to call the just, but sinners ; " and it 
is solemnly recognized and inculcated by Him, in the 
words which follow the text, " Every one that exalteth 
himself, shall be humbled, and he that humbleth him- 
self, shall be exalted." 

This, you see, my brethren, is very different from 
that merely general acknowledgment of human guilt, 
and of the need of expiation, contained in those old 
and popular religions, which have before now occupied, 
or still occupy, the world. In them, guilt is an attri- 
bute of individuals, or of particular places, or of par- 
ticular acts of nations, of bodies politic or their rulers, 
for whom, in consequence, purification is necessary. Or 
it is the purification of the worshipper, not so much 
personal as ritual, before he makes his offering, and 
an act of introduction to his religious service. All such 
practices indeed are remnants of true religion, and 
tokens and witnesses of it, useful both in themselves 
and in their import; but they do not rise to the ex- 
plicitness and the fulness of the Christian doctrine. 
*' There is not any man just." " All have sinned, and 
do need the glory of God." " Not by the works of 
justice, which we have done, but according to His 
mercy." The disciples of other worships and other 



188 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

philosophies thought and think, that the many indeed 
are bad, but the few are good. As their thoughts 
passed on from the ignorant and erring multitude to 
the select specimens of mankind, they left the notion 
of guilt behind, and they pictured for themselves an 
idea of truth and wisdom, perfect, indefectible, and 
self-sufficient. It was a sort of virtue without imper- 
fection, which took pleasure in contemplating itself, 
which needed nothing, and which was, from its own in- 
ternal excellence, sure of a reward. Their descriptions, 
their stories of good and religious men, are often beau- 
tiful, and admit of an instructive interpretation ; but 
in themselves they have this great blot, that they make 
no mention of sin, and that they speak as if shame and 
humiliation were no properties of the virtuous. I will 
remind you, my brethren, of a very beautiful story, 
which you have read in a writer of antiquity ; and the 
more beautiful it is, the more it is fitted for my pre- 
sent purpose, for the defect in it will come out the 
more strongly by the very contrast, viz. the defect 
that, though in some sense it teaches piety, humility it 
does not teach. I say, when the Psalmist would de- 
scribe the happy man, he says, ''Blessed are they whose 
iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered ; 
blessed is the man to whom the Lord hath not im- 
puted sin." Such is the blessedness of the Gospel; 
but what is the blessedness of the religions of the 
world? A celebrated Greek sage once paid a visit 
to a prosperous king of Lydia, who, after showing him 
all his greatness and his glory, asked him whom he 
considered to have the happiest lot, of all men whom 
he had known. On this, the philosopher, passing by 
the monarch himself, named a countryman of his own, 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 189 

as fulfilling his typical idea of human perfection. The 
most blessed of men, he said, was Tellus of Athens, 
for he lived in a flourishing city, and was prospered in 
his children, and in their families ; and then at length 
when war ensued with a border state, he took his 
place in the battle, repelled the enemy, and died glori- 
ously, being buried at the public expense where he fell, 
and receiving public honours. When the king asked 
who came next to him in Solon's judgment, the sage 
went on to name two brothers, conquerors at the games, 
who, when the oxen were not forthcoming, drew their 
mother, who was priestess, to the- temple, to the great 
admiration of the assembled multitude ; and who, on 
her praying for them the best of possible rewards, 
after sacrificing and feasting, lay down to sleep in the 
temple, and never rose again. No one can deny the 
beauty of these pictures ; but it is for that reason I 
select them ; they are the pictures of men who were 
not supposed to have any grave account to settle with 
heaven, who had easy duties, as they thought, and who 
fulfilled them. 

Now perhaps you will ask me, my brethren, whether 
this heathen idea of religion be not really higher than 
that which I have called pre-eminently Christian ; for 
surely to obey in simple tranquillity and unsolicitous 
confidence, is the noblest conceivable state of the crea- 
ture, and the most acceptable worship he can pay to the 
Creator. Doubtless it is the noblest and most accept- 
able worship ; such has ever been the worship of the 
angels ; such is the worship now of the spirits of the 
just made perfect ; such will be the worship of the 
whole company of the glorified after the general re- 
surrection. But we are engaged in considering the 



190 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

actual state of man, as found in this world ; and I say, 
considering what he is, any standard of duty, which 
does not convict him of real and multiplied sins, and 
of incapacity to please God of his own strength, is 
untrue ; and any rule of life, which leaves him con- 
tented with himself, without fear, without anxiety, 
without humiliation, is deceptive ; it is the blind lead- 
ing the blind ; yet such, in one shape or other, is the 
religion of the whole earth, beyond the pale of the 
Church. 

The natural conscience of man, if cultivated from 
within, if enlightened by those external aids which in 
varying degrees are given him in every place and time, 
would teach him much of his duty to God and man, 
and would lead him on, by the guidance both of Provi- 
dence and grace, into the fulness of religious know- 
ledge ; but, generally speaking, he is contented that it 
should tell him very little, and he makes no efforts to 
gain any juster views than he has at first, of his rela- 
tions to the world around him and to his Creator. 
Thus he apprehends part, and part only, of the moral 
law; has scarcely any idea at all of sanctity; and, 
instead of tracing actions to their source, which is the 
motive, and judging them thereby, he measures them 
for the most part by their effects and their outward 
aspect. Such is the way with the multitude of men 
everywhere and at all times ; they do not see the Image 
of Almighty God before them, and ask themselves what 
He wishes : if once they did this, they would begin to 
see how much He requires, and they would earnestly 
come to Him, both to be pardoned for what they do 
wrong, and for the power to do better. And, for the 
same reason that they do not please Him, they succeed 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 191 

in pleasing themselves. For that contracted, defective 
range of duties, which falls so short of God's law, 
is just what they can fulfil ; or rather they choose it^ 
and keep to it, because they can fulfil it. Hence, they 
become both self-satisfied and self-sufficient ; — they 
think they know just what they ought to do, and that 
they do it aU ; and in consequence they are very well 
content with themselves, and rate their merit very high, 
and have no fear at all of any future scrutiny into 
their conduct, which may befall them, though their 
religion mainly lies in certain outward observances, 
and not a great number even of them. 

So it was with the Pharisee in this day's gospel. He 
looked upon himself with great complacency, for the 
very reason that the standard was so low, and the range 
so narrow, which he assigned to his duties towards God 
and man. He used, or misused, the traditions in which 
he had been brought up, to the purpose of persuading 
himself that perfection lay in merely answering the de- 
mands of society. He professed, indeed, to pay thanks 
to God, but he hardly apprehended the existence of any 
direct duties on his part towards his Maker. He thought 
he did all that God required, if he satisfied public opin- 
ion. To be religious, in the Pharisee's sense, was to 
keep the peace towards others, to take his share in the 
burdens of the poor, to abstain from gross vice, and to 
set a good example. His alms and fastings were not 
done in penance, but because the world asked for them ; 
penance would have implied the consciousness of sin ; 
whereas it was only Publicans, and such as they, who 
had anything to be forgiven. And these indeed were 
the outcasts of society, and despicable ; but no account 
lay against men of well-regulated minds such as his: 



192 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

men who were well-behaved, decorous, consistent, and 
respectable. He thanked God he was a Pharisee, and 
not a penitent. 

Such was the Jew in our Lord's day ; and such the 
heathen was, and had been. Alas ! I do not mean to 
affirm that it was common for the poor heathen to ob- 
serve even any religious rule at all ; but I am speaking 
of the few and of the better sort : and these, I say, 
commonly took up with a religion like the Pharisee's, 
more beautiful perhaps and more poetical, but not at all 
deeper or truer than his. They did not indeed fast, or 
give alms, or observe the ordinances of Judaism ; they 
threw over their meagre observances a philosophical 
garb, and embellished them with the refinements of 
a cultivated intellect ; still their notion of moral and 
religious duty was as shallow as that of the Pharisee, 
and the sense of sin, the habit of self-abasement, and 
the desire of contrition, just as absent from their 
minds as from his. They framed a code of morals 
which they could without trouble obey; and then they 
were content with it and with themselves. Virtue, ac- 
cording to Xenophon, one of the best principled and 
most religious of their writers, and one who had seen 
a great deal of the world, and had the opportunity of 
bringing together in one the highest thoughts of many 
schools and countries, — virtue, according to him, con- 
sists mainly in command of the appetites and passions, 
and in serving others in order that they may serve us. 
He says, in the well-known Fable, called The Choice 
of Hercules, that Vice has no real enjoyment even of 
those pleasures which it aims at ; that it eats before it 
is hungry, and drinks before it is thirsty, and slum- 
bers before it is wearied. It never hears, he says, that 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 193 

sweetest of voices, its own praise; it never sees that 
greatest luxury among sights, its own good deeds. It 
enfeebles the bodily frame of the young, and the intel- 
lect of the old. Virtue, on the other hand, rewards 
young men with the praise of their elders, and it re- 
wards the aged with the reverence of youth ; it supplies 
them pleasant memories and present peace ; it secures 
the favour of heaven, the love of friends, a country's 
thanks, and, when death comes, an everlasting renown. 
In all such descriptions, virtue is something external ; 
it is not concerned with motives or intentions ; it is 
occupied in deeds which bear upon society, and which 
gain the praise of men ; it has little to do with con- 
science and the Lord of conscience ; and knows nothing 
of shame, humiliation, and penance. It is in substance 
the Pharisee's religion, though it be more graceful and 
more interesting. 

Now this age is as removed in distance, as in char- 
acter, from that of the Greek philosopher ; yet who 
will say that the religion which it acts upon is very 
different from the religion of the heathen? Of course 
I understand well, that it might know, and that it will 
say, a great many things foreign and contrary to 
heathenism. I am well aware that the theology of this 
age is very different from what it w^as two thousand 
years ago. I know men profess a great deal, and boast 
that they are Christians, and speak of Christianity as 
being a religion of the heart ; but, when we put aside 
words and professions, and try to discover what their 
religion is, we shall find, I fear, that the great mass of 
men in fact get rid of all religion that is inward ; that 
they lay no stress on acts of faith, hope, and charity, 
on simplicity of intention, purity of motive, or morti- 



194 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

fication of the thoughts ; that they confine themselves 
to two or three virtues, superficially practised ; that 
they know not the words contrition, penance, and par- 
don ; and that they think and argue that, after all, if 
a man does his duty in the world, according to his vo- 
cation, he cannot fail to go to heaven, however little he 
may do besides, nay, however much, in other matters, he 
may do that is undeniably unlawful. Thus a soldier's 
duty is loyalty, obedience, and valour, and he may let 
other matters take their chance ; a trader's duty is 
honesty; an artisan's duty is industry and content- 
ment; of a gentleman are required veracity, courte- 
ousness, and self-respect ; of a public man, high-prin- 
cipled ambition ; of a woman, the domestic virtues ; 
of a minister of religion, decorum, benevolence, and 
some activity. Now, all these are instances of mere 
Pharisaical excellence ; because there is no apprehen- 
sion of Almighty God, no insight into His claims on 
us, no sense of the creature's shortcomings, no self- 
condemnation, confession, and deprecation, nothing of 
those deep and sacred feelings which ever characterize 
the religion of a Christian, and more and more, not 
less and less, as he mounts up from mere ordinary 
obedience to the perfection of a saint. 

And such, I say, is the religion of the natural man 
in every age and place ; — often very beautiful on the 
surface, but worthless in God's sight ; good, as far as 
it goes, but worthless and hopeless, because it does 
not go further, because it is based on self-sufficiency, 
and results in self-satisfaction. I grant, it may be 
beautiful to look at, as in the instance of the young 
ruler whom our Lord looked at and loved, yet sent 
away sad ; it may have all the delicacy, the amiable- 



THE BELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 195 

ness, the tenderness, the religious sentiment, the kind- 
ness, which is actually seen in many a father of a 
family, many a mother, many a daughter, in the length 
and breadth of these kingdoms, in a refined and pol- 
ished age like this ; but still it is rejected by the 
heart-searching God, because all such persons walk by 
their own light, not by the True Light of men, because 
self is their supreme teacher, and because they pace 
round and round in the small circle of their own 
thoughts and of their own judgments, careless to know 
what God says to them, and fearless of being con- 
demned by Him, if only they stand approved in their 
own sight. And thus they incur the force of those 
terrible words, spoken not to a Jewish Ruler, nor to 
a heathen philosopher, but to a fallen Christian com- 
munity, to the Christian Pharisees of Laodicea, — 
"Because thou sayest I am rich, and made wealthy, 
and have need of nothing ; and knowest not that thou 
art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and 
naked ; I counsel thee to buy of Me gold fire-tried, 
that thou mayest be made rich, and be clothed in white 
garments, that thy shame may not appear, and anoint 
thine eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see. Such 
as I love, I rebuke and chastise ; be zealous, therefore, 
and do penance." 

Yes, my brethren, it is the ignorance of our under- 
standing, it is our spiritual blindness, it is our banish- 
ment from the presence of Him who is the source and 
the standard of all Truth, which is the cause of this 
meagre, heartless religion of which men are commonly 
so proud. Had we any proper insight into things as 
they are, had we any real apprehension of God as He 
is, of ourselves as we are, we should never dare to serve 



196 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Him without fear, or to rejoice unto Him without 
trembling. And it is the removal of this veil which is 
spread between our eyes and heaven, it is the pouring 
in upon the soul of the illuminating grace of the New 
Covenant, which makes the religion of the Christian 
so different from that of the various human rites and 
philosophies, which are spread over the earth. The 
Catholic saints alone confess sin, because the Catholic 
saints alone see God. That awful Creator Spirit, of 
whom the Epistle of this day speaks so much. He it is 
who brings into religion the true devotion, the true 
worship, and changes the self-satisfied Pharisee into 
the broken-hearted, self -abased Publican. It is the 
sight of God, revealed to the eye of faith, that makes 
us hideous to ourselves, from the contrast which we 
find ourselves to present to that great God at whom 
we look. It is the vision of Him in His infinite 
gloriousness, the All-holy, the All-beautiful, the All- 
perfect, which makes us sink into the earth with self- 
contempt and self-abhorrence. We are contented with 
ourselves till we contemplate Him. Why is it, I say, 
that the moral code of the world is so precise and well- 
defined ? Why is the worship of reason so calm ? Why 
was the religion of classic heathenism so joyous ? Why 
is the framework of civilized society all so graceful 
and so correct ? Why, on the other hand, is there so 
much of emotion, so much of conflicting and alternating 
feeling, so much that is high, so much that is abased, 
in the devotion of Christianity ? It is because the Chris- 
tian, and the Christian alone, has a revelation of God ; 
it is because he has upon his mind, in his heart, on his 
conscience, the idea of one who is Self-dependent, who 
is from Everlasting, who is Incommunicable. He knows 



THE RELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 197 

tliat One alone is holy, and that His own creatures are 
so frail in comparison of Him, that they would dwindle 
and melt away in His presence, did He not uphold 
them by His power. He knows that there is One whose 
greatness and whose blessedness are not affected, the 
centre of whose stability is not moved, by the presence 
or the absence of the whole creation with its innumer- 
able beings and portions; whom nothing can touch, 
nothing can increase or diminish ; who was as mighty 
before He made the worlds as since, and as serene and 
blissful since He made them as before. He knows that 
there is just One Being, in whose hand lies his own 
happiness, his own sanctity, his own life, and hope, and 
salvation. He knows that there is One to whom he 
owes everything, and against whom he can have no 
plea or remedy. All things are nothing before Him ; 
the highest beings do but worship Him the more ; the 
holiest beings are such, only because they have a 
greater portion of Him. 

Ah ! what has he to pride in now, when he looks 
back upon himself? Where has fled all that come- 
liness which heretofore he thought embellished him? 
What is he but some vile reptile, which ought to 
shrink aside out of the light of day ? This was the 
feeling of St. Peter, when he first gained a glimpse of 
the greatness of his Master, and cried out, almost be- 
side himself, " Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, 
O Lord ! " It was the feeling of holy Job, though he* 
had served God for so many years, and had been so 
perfected in virtue, when the Almighty answered him 
from the whirlwind : " With the hearing of the ear I 
have heard Thee," he said ; " but now my eye seeth 
Thee ; therefore I reprove myself, and do penance in 



198 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

dust and ashes." So was it with Isaias, when he saw 
the vision of the Seraphim, and said, " Woe is me . . . 
I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst 
of a people that hath unclean lips, and I have seen 
with my eyes the King, the Lord of Hosts." So was it 
with Daniel, when, even at the sight of an Angel, sent 
from God, " there remained no strength in him, but 
the appearance of his countenance was changed in him, 
and he fainted away, and retained no strength." This 
then, my brethren, is the reason why every son of man, 
whatever be his degree of holiness, whether a return- 
ing prodigal or a matured saint, says with the Pub- 
lican, " O God, be merciful to me ; " it is because cre- 
ated natures, high and low, are all on a level in the 
sight and in comparison of the Creator, and so all of 
them have one speech, and one only, whether it be the 
thief on the cross, Magdalen at the feast, or St. Paul 
before his martyrdom : — not that one of them may 
not have what another has not, but that one and all 
have nothing but what comes from Him, and are as 
nothing before Him, who is all in all. 

For us, my dear brethren, whose duties lie in this 
seat of learning and science, may we never be carried 
away by any undue fondness for any human branch 
of study, so as to be forgetful that our true wisdom, 
and nobility, and strength, consist in the knowledge of 
Almighty God. Nature and man are our studies, but 
God is higher than all. It is easy to lose Him in His 
works. It is easy to become over-attached to our own 
pursuit, to substitute it for religion, and to make it the 
fuel of pride. Our secular attainments will avail us 
nothing, if they be not subordinate to religion. The 



THE BELIGION OF THE PHARISEE 199 

knowledge of the sun, moon, and stars, of the earth and 
its three kmgdoms, of the classics, or of history, will 
never bring us to heaven. We may " thank God " that 
we are not as the illiterate and the dull ; and those whom 
we despise, if they do but know how to ask mercy of 
Him, know what is very much more to the purpose 
of getting to heaven than all our letters and all our 
science. Let this be the spirit in which we end our 
session. Let us thank Him for all that He has done 
for us, for what He is doing by us ; but let nothing that 
we know or that we can do, keep us from a personal, 
individual adoption of the great Apostle's words, 
" Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners, of 
whom I am the chief." 



SELECTIONS FROM "HISTORICAL SKETCHES'' 

ABELARD 

And, as it happens in kings' cabinets, that sur- 
mises arise, and rumours spread, of what is said in 
council, and is in course of preparation, and secrets 
perhaps get wind, true in substance or in direction, 
though distorted in detail ; so too, before the Church 
speaks, one or other of her forward children speaks for 
her, and, while he does anticipate to a certain point 
what she is about to say or enjoin, he states it incor- 
rectly, makes it error instead of truth, and risks his 
own faith in the process. Indeed, tKis is actually one 
source, or rather concomitant, of heresy, the presence 
of some misshapen, huge, and grotesque foreshadow of 
true statements which are to come. Speaking under 
correction, I would apply this remark to the heresy of 
TertuUian or of Sabellius, which may be considered a 
reaction from existing errors, and an attempt, presump- 
tuous, and therefore unsuccessful, to meet them with 
those divinely appointed correctives which the Church 
alone can apply, and which she will actually apply, 
when the proper moment comes. The Gnostics boasted 
of their intellectual proficiency before the time of 
St. Irenaeus, St. Athanasius, and St. Augustine ; yet, 
when these doctors made their appearance, I suppose 
they were examples of that knowledge, true and deep, 



ABELABB 201 

which the Gnostics professed. ApoUinaris anticipated 
the work of St. Cyril and the Ephesine Council, and 
became an heresiarch in consequence ; and, to come 
down to the present times, we may conceive that writ- 
ers, who have impatiently fallen away from the Church, 
because she would not adopt their views, would have 
found, had they but trusted her, and waited, that she 
knew how to profit by them, though she never could 
have need to borrow her enunciations from them ; for 
their writings contained, so to speak, truth in the ore^ 
truth which they themselves had not the gift to dis- 
engage from its foreign concomitants, and safely use, 
which she alone could use, which she would use in her 
destined hour, and which became their stone of stumb- 
ling simply because she did not use it faster. Now, ap- 
plying this principle to the subject before us, I observe, 
that, supposing Abelard to be the first master of scho- 
lastic philosophy, as many seem to hold, we shall have 
still no difficulty in condemning the author, while we 
honour the work. To him is only the glory of spoiling 
by his own self-will what would have been done well 
and surely under the teaching and guidance of Infal- 
lible Authority. 

Nothing is more certain than that some ideas are 
consistent with one another, and others inconsistent ; 
and again, that every truth must be consistent with 
every other truth ; — hence, that all truths of whatever 
kind form into one large body of Truth, by virtue of 
the consistency between one truth and another, which 
is a connecting link running through them all. The 
science which discovers this connection is logic ; and, 
as it discovers the connection when the truths are given, 
so, having one truth given and the connecting princi- 



202 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

pie, it is able to go on to ascertain the other. Though 
all this is obvious, it was realized and acted on in 
the Middle Age with a distinctness unknown before; 
all subjects of knowledge were viewed as parts of one 
vast system, each with its own place in it, and from 
knowing one, another was inferred. Not indeed always 
rightly inferred, because the art might be less perfect 
than the science, the instrument than the theory and 
aim ; but I am speaking of the principle of the scho- 
lastic method, of which Saints and Doctors were the 
teachers ; — such I conceive it to be, and Abelard 
was the ill-fated logician who had a principal share in 
bringing it into operation. 

Others will consider the great St. Anselm and the 
school of Bee as the proper source of Scholasticism ; 
I am not going to discuss the question ; anyhow, Abe- 
lard, and not St. Anselm, was the Professor at the 
University of Paris, and it is of Universities that I am 
speaking; anyhow, Abelard illustrates the strength 
and the weakness of the principle of advertising and 
communicating knowledge for its own sake, which I have 
called the University principle, whether he is, or is 
not, the first of scholastic philosophers or scholastic 
theologians. And, though I could not speak of him at 
all without mentioning the subject of his teaching, 
yet, after all, it is of him and of his teaching itself that 
I am going to speak, whatever that might be which he 
actually taught. 

Since Charlemagne's time the schools of Paris had 
continued, with various fortunes, faithful, as far as 
the age admitted, to the old learning, as other schools 
elsewhere, when, in the eleventh century, the famous 
school of Bee began to develop the powers of logic in 



ABELABD 203 

forming a new philosophy. As the inductive method 
rose in Bacon, so did the logical in the mediaeval school- 
men ; and Aristotle, the most comprehensive intellect 
of antiquity, as the one who had conceived the sub- 
lime idea of mapping the whole field of knowledge, 
and subjecting all things to one profound analysis, 
became the presiding master in their lecture halls. It 
was at the end of the eleventh century that William 
of Champeaux founded the celebrated Abbey of St. 
Victor under the shadow of Ste. Genevieve, and by the 
dialectic methods which he introduced into his teaching 
has a claim to have commenced the work of forming 
the University out of the Schools of Paris. For one 
at least, out of the two characteristics of a University, 
he prepared the way ; for, though the schools were not 
public till after his day, so as to admit laymen as well 
as clerks, and foreigners as well as natives of the place, 
yet the logical principle of constructing all sciences 
into one system implied of course a recognition of all 
the sciences that are comprehended in it. Of this 
William of Champeaux, or de Campellis, Abelard was 
the pupil ; he had studied the dialectic art elsewhere, 
before he offered himself for his instructions ; and, in 
the course of two years, when as yet he had only 
reached the age of twenty-two, he made such progress 
as to be capable of quarrelling with his master, and 
setting up a school for himself. 

This school of Abelard was first situated in the 
royal castle of Melun ; then at Corbeil, which was 
nearer to Paris, and where he attracted to himself 
a considerable number of hearers. His labours had 
an injurious effect upon his health; and at length he 
withdrew for two years to his native Brittany. Whether 



204 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

other causes co-operated in this withdrawal, I think, is 
not known ; but, at the end of the two years, we find him 
returning to Paris, and renewing his attendance on 
the lectures of William, who was by this time a monk. 
Rhetoric was the subject of the lectures he now heard ; 
and after a while the pupil repeated with greater force 
and success his former treatment of his teacher. He 
held a public disputation with him, got the victory, 
and reduced him to silence. The school of William 
was deserted, and its master himself became an in- 
stance of the vicissitudes incident to that gladiatorial 
wisdom (as I may style it) which was then eclipsing 
the old Benedictine method of the Seven Arts. After 
a time, Abelard found his reputation sufficient to 
warrant him in setting up a school himself on Mount 
Ste. Genevieve ; whence he waged incessant war against 
the unwearied logician, who by this time had rallied 
his forces to repel the young and ungrateful adventurer 
who had raised his hand against him. 

Great things are done by devotion to one idea ; there 
is one class of geniuses, who would never be what they 
are, could they grasp a second. The calm philosoph- 
ical mind, which contemplates parts without denying 
the whole, and the whole without confusing the parts, 
is notoriously indisposed to action ; whereas single and 
simple views arrest the mind, and hurry it on to carry 
them out. Thus, men of one idea and nothing more, 
whatever their merit, must be to a certain extent nar- 
row-minded ; and it is not wonderful that Abelard's 
devotion to the new philosophy made him undervalue 
the Seven Arts out of which it had grown. He felt 
it impossible so to honour what was now to be added, 
as not to dishonour what existed before. He would not 



ABELARD 205 

suffer the Arts to have their own use, since he had 
found a new instriunent for a new purpose. So he 
opposed the reading of the Classics. The monks had 
opposed them before him ; but this is little to our 
present purpose ; it was the duty of men, who abjured 
the gifts of this world on the principle of mortifica- 
tion, to deny themselves literature just as they would 
deny themselves particular friendships or figured 
music. The doctrine which Abelard introduced and 
represents was founded on a different basis. He did 
not recognize in the poets of antiquity any other merit 
than that of furnishing an assemblage of elegant 
phrases and figures ; and accordingly he asks why they 
should not be banished from the city of God, since 
Plato banished them from his own commonwealth. 
The animus of this language is clear, when we turn 
to the pages of John of Salisbury and Peter of Blois, 
who were champions of the ancient learning. We find 
them complaining that the careful '' getting up," as we 
now call it, *' of books," was growing out of fashion. 
Youths once studied critically the text of poets or 
philosophers ; they got them by heart ; they analyzed 
their arguments ; they noted down their fallacies ; 
they were closely examined in the matters which had 
been brought before them in lecture ; they composed. 
But now, another teaching was coming in ; students 
were promised truth in a nutshell ; they intended to 
get possession of the sum-total of philosophy in less 
tlian two or three years ; and facts were apprehended, 
not in their substance and details, by means of living 
and, as it were, personal documents, but in dead ab- 
stracts and tables. Such were the reclamations to 
which the new Logic gave occasion. 



206 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

These, however, are lesser matters ; we have a 
graver quarrel with Abelard than that of his under- 
valuing the Classics. As I have said, my main object 
here is not what he taught, but why and how, and how 
he lived. Now it is certain, his activity was stimulated 
by nothing very high, but something very earthly and 
sordid. I grant there is nothing morally wrong in the 
mere desire to rise in the world, though Ambition and 
it are twin sisters. I should not blame Abelard merely 
for wishing to distinguish himself at the University ; 
but when he makes the ecclesiastical state the instru- 
ment of his ambition, mixes up spiritual matters with 
temporal, and aims at a bishopric through the medium 
of his logic, he joins together things incompatible, and 
cannot complain of being censured. It is he himself 
who tells us, unless my memory plays me false, that 
the circumstance of William of Champeaux being 
promoted to the see of Chalons, was an incentive to 
him to pursue the same path with an eye to the same 
reward. Accordingly, we next hear of his attending 
the theological lectures of a certain master of Wil- 
liam's, named Anselm, an old man, whose school was 
situated at Laon. This person had a great reputation 
in his day; John of Salisbury, speaking of him in 
the next generation, calls him the doctor of doctors ; 
he had been attended by students from Italy and 
Germany ; but the age had advanced since he was in 
his prime, and Abelard was disappointed in a teacher 
who had been good enough for William. He left An- 
selm, and began to lecture on the prophet Ezekiel on 
his own resources. 

Now came the time of his great popularity, which 
was more than his head could bear; which dizzied 



ABELARD 207 

him, took him off his legs, and whirled him to his 
destruction. I spoke in my foregoing chapter of those 
three qualities of true wisdom, which a University, 
absolutely and nakedly considered, apart from the 
safeguards which constitute its integrity, is sure to 
compromise. Wisdom, says the inspired writer, is 
desursum^ is pudica^ is pacifica^ " from above, chaste, 
peaceable." We have already seen enough of Abe- 
lard's career to understand that his wisdom, instead of 
being " pacifica," was ambitious and contentious. An 
Apostle speaks of the tongue both as a blessing and 
as a curse. It may be the beginning of a fire, he says, 
a " Universitas iniquitatis ; " and alas ! such did it 
become in the mouth of the gifted Abelard. His elo- 
quence was wonderful ; he dazzled his contemporaries, 
says Fulco, '' by the brilliancy of his genius, the sweet- 
ness of his eloquence, the ready flow of his language, 
and the subtlety of his knowledge." People came to 
him from all quarters ; — from Rome, in spite of moun- 
tains and robbers ; from England, in spite of the sea ; 
from Flanders and Germany ; from Normandy, and the 
remote districts of France ; from Angers and Poitiers ; 
from Navarre by the Pyrenees, and from Spain, be- 
sides the students of Paris itself ; and among those 
who sought his instructions now or afterwards were the 
great luminaries of the schools in the next generation. 
Such were Peter of Poitiers, Peter Lombard, John 
of Salisbury, Arnold of Brescia, Ivo, and Geoffrey of 
Auxerre. It was too much for a weak head and heart, 
weak in spite of intellectual power; for vanity will 
possess the head, and worldliness the heart, of the 
man, however gifted, whose wisdom is not an effluence 
of the Eternal Light. 



208 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

True wisdom is not only " pacifica," it is '^pudica ; " 
chaste as well as peaceable. Alas for Abelard I a sec- 
ond disgrace, deeper than ambition, is his portion now. 
The strong man — the Samson of the schools in the 
wildness of his course, the Solomon in the fascination 
of his genius — shivers and falls before the temptation 
which overcame that mighty pair, the most excelling in 
body and in mind. 

Desire of wine, and all delicious drinks, , 
Which many a famous warrior overturns. 
Thou couldst repress; nor did the dancing ruby 
Sparkling outpour'd, the flavour or the smell, 
Or taste that cheers the heart of gods and men, 
Allure thee from the cool crystalline stream. 
But what availed this temperance, not complete^ 
Against another object more enticing ? 
What boots it at one gate to make defence, 
And at another to let in the foe, 
Effeminately vanquished ? 

In a time when colleges were unknown, and the 
young scholar was commonly thrown upon the dubious 
hospitality of a great city, Abelard might even be 
thought careful of his honour, that he went to lodge 
with an old ecclesiastic, had not his host's niece Eloisa 
lived with him. A more subtle snare was laid for him 
than beset the heroic champion or the all-accomplished 
monarch of Israel ; for sensuality came upon him under 
the guise of intellect, and it was the high mental endow- 
ments of Eloisa, who became his pupil, speaking in her 
eyes, and thrilling on her tongue, which were the intox- 
ication and the delirium of Abelard. . . . 

He is judged, he is punished ; — but he is not re* 
claimed. True wisdom is not only "pacifica," not only 
"pudica;" it is "desursum" too. It is a revelation 



ABELARD 209 

from above; it knows heresy as little as it knows strife 
or licence. But Abelard, who had run the career of 
earthly wisdom in two of its phases, now is destined to 
represent its third. 

It is at the famous Abbey of St. Denis that we find 
him languidly rising from his dream of sin, and the 
suffering that followed. The bad dream is cleared 
away ; clerks come to him and the Abbot, — begging 
him to lecture still, for love now, as for gain before. 
Once more his school is thronged by the curious and 
the studious ; but at length a rumour spreads, that 
Abelard is exploring the way to some novel view on 
the subject of the Most Holy Trinity. Wherefore is 
hardly clear, but about the same time the monks drive 
him away from the place of refuge he had gained. He 
betakes himself to a cell, and thither his pupils follow 
him. " I betook myself to a certain cell," he says, 
'' wishing to give myself to the schools, as was my cus- 
tom. Thither so great a multitude of scholars flocked, 
that there was neither room to house them, nor fruits 
of the earth to feed them," such was the enthusiasm 
of the student, such the attraction of the teacher, 
when knowledge was advertised freely, and its market 
opened. 

Next he is in Champagne, in a delightful solitude, 
near Nogent in the diocese of Troyes. Here the same 
phenomenon presents itself, which is so frequent in his 
history. '' When the scholars knew it," he says, "they 
began to crowd thither from all parts ; and, leaving 
other cities and strongholds, they were content to dwell 
in the wilderness. For spacious houses they framed 
for themselves small tabernacles, and for delicate food 
they put up with wild herbs. Secretly did they whisper 



210 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

among themselves : ' Behold, the whole world is gone 
out after him ! ' When, however, my Oratory could 
not hold even a moderate portion of them, then they 
were forced to enlarge it, and to build it up with wood 
and stone." He called the place his Paraclete, because 
it had been his consolation. 

I do not know why I need follow his life further. I 
have said enough to illustrate the course of one, who 
may be called the founder, or at least the first great 
name, of the Parisian schools. After the events I have 
mentioned he is found in Lower Brittany ; then, 
being about forty-eight years of age, in the Abbey of 
St. Gildas ; then with Ste. Genevieve again. He had to 
sustain the fiery eloquence of a Saint, directed against 
his novelties ; he had to present himself before two 
Councils ; he had to burn the book which had given 
offence to pious ears. His last two years were spent 
at Clugni on his way to Rome. The home of the weary, 
the hospital of the sick, the school of the erring, the 
tribunal of the penitent, is the city of St. Peter. He 
did not reach it ; but he is said to have retracted what 
had given scandal in his writings, and to have made 
an edifying end. He died at the age of sixty-two, in 
the year of grace 1142. 

In reviewing his career, the career of so great an 
intellect so miserably thrown away, we are reminded of 
the famous words of the dying scholar and jurist, which 
are a lesson to us all : " Heu, vifcam perdidi, operose 
nihil agendo." A happier lot be ours ! 



THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 211 



THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 

To eat bread in the sweat of his brow is the original 
punishment of mankind ; the indolence of the savage 
shrinks from the obligation, and looks out for methods 
of escaping it. Com, wine, and oil have no charms for 
him at such a price ; he turns to the brute animals 
which are his aboriginal companions, the horse, the 
cow, and the sheep; he chooses to be a grazier rather 
than to till the ground. He feeds his horses, flocks, 
and herds on its spontaneous vegetation, and then in 
turn he feeds himself on their flesh. He remains on 
one spot while the natural crop yields them sustenance ; 
when it is exhausted, he migrates to another. He 
adopts what is called the life of a nomad. In mari- 
time countries indeed he must have recourse to other 
expedients ; he fishes in the stream, or among the rocks 
of the beach. In the woods he betakes himself to roots 
and wild honey ; or he has a resource in the chase, an 
occupation, ever ready at hand, exciting, and demand- 
ing no perseverance. But when the savage finds him- 
self enclosed in the continent and the wilderness, he 
draws the domestic animals about him, and constitutes 
himself the head of a sort of brute polity. He becomes 
a king and father of the beasts, and by the economical 
arrangements which this pretension involves, advances 
a first step, though a low one, in civilization, which the 
hunter or the fisher does not attain. 

And here, beyond other animals, the horse is the 
instrument of that civilization. It enables him to gov- 
ern and to guide his sheep and cattle; it carries him to 
the chase, when he is tempted to it ; it transports him 



212 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

and his from place to place ; while his very locomotion 
and shifting location and independence of the soil de- 
fine the idea, and secure the existence, both of a house- 
hold and of personal property. Nor is this all which 
the horse does for him; it is food both in its life and 
in its death; — when dead, it nourishes him with its 
flesh, and, while alive, it supplies its milk for an in- 
toxicating liquor which, under the name of koumiss^ 
has from time immemorial served the Tartar instead 
of wine or spirits. The horse then is his friend under 
all circumstances, and inseparable from him ; he may 
be even said to live on horseback, he eats and sleeps 
without dismounting, till the fable has been current 
that he has a centaur's nature, half man and half 
beast. Hence it was that the ancient Saxons had a 
horse for their ensign in war ; thus it is that the Ot- 
toman ordinances are, I believe, to this day dated from 
*' the imperial stirrup," and the display of horsetails 
at the gate of the palace is the Ottoman signal of war. 
Thus too, as the Catholic ritual measures intervals by 
*'a Miserere," and St. Ignatius in his Exercises by 
*'a Pater Noster," so the Turcomans and the Usbeks 
speak familiarly of the time of a gallop. But as to 
houses, on the other hand, the Tartars contemptuously 
called them the sepulchres of the living, and, when 
abroad, could hardly be persuaded to cross a threshold. 
Their women, indeed, and children could not live on 
horseback; them some kind of locomotive dwelling 
must receive, and a less noble animal must draw. The 
old historians and poets of Greece and Rome describe 
it, and the travellers of the Middle Ages repeat and 
enlarge the Classical description of it. The strangers 
from Europe gazed with astonishment on huge wattled 



THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 213 

houses set on wheels, and drawn by no less than twenty- 
two oxen. 

From the age of Job, the horse has been the em- 
blem of battle ; a mounted shepherd is but one remove 
from a knight-errant, except in the object of his ex- 
cursions ; and the discipline of a pastoral station, from 
the nature of the case, is not very different from 
that of a camp. There can be no community without 
order, and a community in motion demands a special 
kind of organization. Provision must be made for the 
separation, the protection, and the sustenance of men, 
women, and children, horses, flocks, and cattle. To 
inarch without straggling, to halt without confusion, to 
make good their ground, to reconnoitre neighbourhoods, 
to ascertain the character and capabilities of places in 
the distance, and to determine their future route, is to 
be versed in some of the most important duties of the 
military art. Such pastoral tribes are already an army 
in the field, if not as yet against any human foe, at 
least against the elements. They have to subdue, or to 
check, or to circumvent, or to endure the opposition of 
earth, water, and wind, in their pursuits of the mere 
necessaries of life. The war with wild beasts naturally 
follows, and then the war on their own kind. Thus 
when they are at length provoked or allured to direct 
their fury against the inhabitants of other regions, 
they are ready-made soldiers. They have a soldier's 
qualifications in their independence of soil, freedom 
from local ties, and practice in discipline ; nay, in one 
respect they are superior to any troops which civilized 
countries can produce. One of the problems of war- 
fare is how to feed the vast masses w^hich its operatiaits 



214 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

require ; and hence it is commonly said that a well- 
managed conmiissariat is a chief ^condition of victory. 
Few people can fight without eating ; — Englishmen 
as little as any. I have heard of a work of a foreign 
officer, who took a survey of the European armies pre- 
viously to the revolutionary war ; in which he praised 
our troops highly, but said they would not be effective 
till they were supported by a better commissariat. 
Moreover, one commonly hears that the supply of this 
deficiency is one of the very merits of the great Duke 
of Wellington. So it is with civilized races ; but the 
Tartars, as is evident from what I have already ob- 
served, have in their wars no need of any commissariat 
at all ; and that not merely from the unscrupulousness 
of their foraging, but because they find in the instru- 
ments of their conquests the staple of their food. " Corn 
is a bulky and perishable commodity,''^ says an his- 
torian ; "and the large magazines, which are indispen- 
sably necessary for the subsistence of civilized troops, 
are difficult and slow of transport." But, not to say 
that even their flocks and herds were fitted for rapid 
movement, like the nimble sheep of Wales and the 
wild cattle of North Britain, the Tartars could even 
dispense with these altogether. If straitened for pro- 
visions, they ate the chargers which carried them to 
battle ; indeed they seemed to account their flesh a 
delicacy, above the reach of the poor, and in conse- 
quence were enjoying a banquet in circumstances when 
civilized troops would be staving off starvation. And 
with a view to such accidents, they have been accus- 
tomed to carry with them in their expeditions a number 
of supernumerary horses, which they might either ricle 
or eat, according to the occasion. It was an additional 



TEE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 215 

advantage to them in their warlike movements that 
they were little particular whether their food had been 
killed for the purpose, or had died of disease. Nor is 
this all : their horses' hides were made into tents and 
clothing, perhaps into bottles and coracles ; and their 
intestines into bowstrings.^ 

Trained, then, as they are, to habits which in them- 
selves invite to war, the inclemency of their native 
climate has been a constant motive for them to seek 
out settlements and places of sojournment elsewhere. 
The spacious plains, over which they roam, are either 
monotonous grazing-lands, or inhospitable deserts, re- 
lieved with green valleys or recesses. The cold is in- 
tense in a degree of which we have no experience in 
England, though we lie to the north of them.^ This 
arises in a measure from their distance from the sea, 
and again from their elevation of level, and further 
from the saltpetre with which their soil or their atmo- 
sphere is impregnated. The sole influence, then, of their 
fatherland, if I may apply to it such a term, is to drive 
its inhabitants from it to the west or to the south. 

I have said that the geographical features of their 
country carry them forward in those two directions, 
the south and the west ; not to say that the ocean 
forbids them going eastward, and the north does but 
hold out to them a climate more inclement than their 
own. Leaving the district of Mongolia in the further- 
most east, high above the north of China, and pass- 
ing through the long and broad valleys which I spoke 
of just now, the emigrants at length would arrive at 

^ Caldecott's Baber, 

2 Vide Mitford's Greece, vol. viii, p. 86. 



216 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the edge of that elevated plateau which constitutes 
Tartaiy proper. They would pass over the high re- 
gion of Pamer, where are the sources of the Oxus, they 
would descend the terrace of the Bolor, and the steeps 
of Badakshan, and gradually reach a vast region, flat 
on the whole as the expanse they had left, but as 
strangely depressed below the level of the sea as Tar- 
tary is lifted above it.^ This is the country, forming 
the two basins of the Aral and the Caspian, which 
terminates the immense Asiatic plain, and may be 
vaguely designated by the name of Turkistan. Hith- 
erto the necessity of their route would force them on, 
in one multitudinous emigration, but now they may 
diverge, and have diverged. If they were to cross the 
Jaxartes and the Oxus, and then to proceed south- 
ward, they would come to Khorasan, the ancient Bac- 
triana, and so to Affghanistan and to Hindostan on 
the east, or to Persia on the west. But if, instead y 
they continued their westward course, then they would 
skirt the north coast of the Aral and the Caspian, cross 
the Volga, and there would have a second opportunity, 
if they chose to avail themselves of it, of descending 
southwards, by Georgia and Armenia, either to Syria 
or to Asia Minor. Refusing this diversion, and per- 
severing onwards to the west, at length they would pass 
the Don, and descend upon Europe across the Ukraine, 
Bessarabia, and the Danube. 

Such are the three routes — across the Oxus, across 
the Caucasus, and across the Danube — which the 
pastoral nations have variously pursued at various 
times, when their roving habits, their warlike propen- 
sities, and their discomforts at home, have combined to 
^ Pribchard's Researches. 



THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 217 

precipitate them on the industry^ the civilization, and 
the luxury of the West and of the South, And at 
such times, as might be inferred from what has been 
already said, their invasions have been rather irrup- 
tions, inroads, or what are called raids, than a proper 
conquest and occupation of the countries which have 
been their victims. They would go forward^ 200,000 
of them at once, at the rate of a hundred miles a day^ 
swimming the rivers, galloping over the plains, intoxi- 
cated with the excitement of air and speed, as if it 
were a fox-chase, or full of pride and fury at the re- 
verses which set them in motion ; seeking indeed their 
fortunes, but seeking them on no plan ; like a flight o£ 
locusts, or a swarm of angry wasps smoked out of their 
nest. They would seek for immediate gratification ^ and 
let the future take its course. They would be blood- 
thirsty and rapacious, and would inflict ruin and mis- 
ery to any extent ; and they would do tenfold more 
harm to the invaded than benefit to themselves. They 
would be powerful to break down ; helpless to build 
up. They would in a day undo the labour and skill, 
the prosperity of years ; but they would not know how 
to construct a polity, how to conduct a government, 
how to organize a system of slavery, or to digest a code 
of laws. Rather, they would despise the sciences of 
politics, law, and finance ; and if they honoured any 
profession or vocation, it would be such as bore imme- 
diately and personally on themselves. Thus we find 
them treating the priest and the physician with re- 
spect, when they found such among their captives ; but 
they could not endure the presence of a lawyer. How 
could it be otherwise with those who may be called the 
outlaws of the human race ? They did but justify the 



218 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

seeming paradox of the traveller's exclamation, who, 
when at length, after a dreary passage through the 
wilderness, he came in sight of a gibbet, returned 
thanks that he had now arrived at a civilized country. 
'^ The pastoral tribes,'' says the writer I have already 
quoted, " who were ignorant of the distinction of 
landed property, must have disregarded the use, as 
well as the abuse, of civil jurisprudence ; and the skill 
of an eloquent lawyer would excite only their contempt 
or their abhorrence." And he refers to an outrage 
on the part of a barbarian of the North, who, not 
satisfied with cutting out a lawyer's tongue, sewed up 
his mouth, in order, as he said, that the viper might 
no longer hiss. The well-known story of the Czar 
Peter, himself a Tartar, is here in point. When told 
there were some thousands of lawyers at Westminster, 
he is said to have observed that there had been only 
two in his own dominions, and he had hung one of 
them. 

Now I have thrown the various inhabitants of the 
Asiatic plain together, under one description, not as if 
I overlooked, or undervalued, the distinction of races, 
but because I have no intention of committing myself 
to any statements on so intricate and interminable a 
subject as ethnology. In spite of the controversy about 
skulls, and skins, and languages, by means of which 
man is to be traced up to his primitive condition, 
I consider place and climate to be a sufficiently real 
aspect under which he may be regarded, and with this 
I shall content myself. I am speaking of the inhabit- 
ants of those extended plains, whether Scythians, 
Massagetae, Sarmatians, Huns, Moguls, Tartars, Turks, 



THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 219 

or anything else ; and whether or no any of them or 
all of them are identical with each other in their pedi- 
gree and antiquities. Position and climate create hab- 
its ; and since the country is called Tartary, I shall 
call them Tartar habits, and the populations which 
have inhabited it and exhibited them, Tartars, for con- 
venience' sake, whatever be their family descent. From 
the circumstances of their situation, these populations 
have in all ages been shepherds, mounted on horse- 
back, roaming through trackless spaces, easily incited 
to war, easily formed into masses, easily dissolved again 
into their component parts, suddenly sweeping across 
continents, suddenly descending on the South or West, 
suddenly extinguishing the civilization of ages, sud- 
denly forming empires, suddenly vanishing, no one 
knows how, into their native North. 

Such is the fearful provision for havoc and devasta- 
tion, when the Divine Word goes forth for judgment 
upon the civilized world, which the North has ever had 
in store ; and the regions on which it has principally 
expended its fury are those whose fatal beauty, or 
richness of soil, or perfection of cultivation, or exqui- 
siteness of produce, or amenity of climate, makes 
them objects of desire to the barbarian. Such are 
China, Hindostan, Persia, Syria, and Anatolia, or the 
Levant, in Asia ; Greece, Italy, Sicily, and Spain, in 
Europe ; and the northern coast of Africa. 

These regions, on the contrary, have neither the in- 
ducement nor the means to retaliate upon their fero- 
cious invaders. The relative position of the combat- 
ants must always be the same while the combat lasts. 
The South has nothing to win, the North nothing to 
lose ; the North nothing to offer, the South nothing to 



220 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

covet. Nor is this all : the North, as in an impregnable 
fortress, defies the attack of the South. Immense 
trackless solitudes ; no cities, no tillage, no roads ; 
deserts, forests, marshes ; bleak table-lands, snowy 
mountains ; unlocated, flitting, receding populations ; 
no capitals, or marts, or strong places, or fruitful vales, 
to hold as hostages for submission ; fearful winters 
and many months of them ; — nature herself fights 
and conquers for the barbarian. What madness shall 
tempt the South to undergo extreme risks without 
the prospect or chance of a return ? True it is, ambi- 
tion, whose very life is a fever, has now and then ven- 
tured on the reckless expedition ; but from the first 
page of history to the last, from Cyrus to Napoleon, 
what has the Northern war done for the greatest war- 
riors but destroy the flower of their armies and the 
prestige of their name? Our maps, in placing the 
North at the top, and the South at the bottom of the 
sheet, impress us, by what may seem a sophistical ana- 
logy, with the imagination that Huns or Moguls, Kal- 
mucks or Cossacks, have been a superincumbent mass, 
descending by a sort of gravitation upon the fair terri- 
tories which lie below them. Yet this is substantially 
true ; — though the attraction towards the South is of 
a moral, not of a physical nature, yet an attraction 
there is, and a huge conglomeration of destructive ele- 
ments hangs over us, and from time to time rushes 
down with an awful irresistible momentum. Barbarism 
is ever impending over the civilized world. Never, 
since history began, has there been so long a cessation 
of this law of human society as in the period in which 
we live. The descent of the Turks on Europe was the 
last instance of it, and that was completed four hun- 



MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 221 

dred years ago. They are now themselves in the position 
of those races, whom they themselves formerly came 
down upon. 

MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 

The Orations which he is known to have composed 
amount in all to about eighty, of which fifty-nine, 
either entire or in part, are preserved. Of these, some 
are deliberative, others judicial, others descriptive ; 
some delivered from the rostrum, or in the senate ; 
others in the forum, or before Caesar ; and, as might 
be anticipated from the character already given of his 
talents, he is much more successful in pleading or in 
panegyric than in debate or invective. In deliberative 
oratory, indeed, great part of the effect of the com- 
position depends on its creating in the hearer a high 
opinion of the speaker ; and though Cicero takes con- 
siderable pains to interest the audience in his favour, 
yet his style is not simple and grave enough, he is too 
ingenious, too declamatory, discovers too much personal 
feeling, to elicit that confidence in him, without which 
argument has little influence. His invectives, again, 
however grand and imposing, yet, compared with his 
calmer and more familiar productions, have a forced 
and unnatural air. Splendid as is the eloquence of his 
Catilinarians and Philippics, it is often the language 
of abuse rather than of indignation ; and even his at- 
tack on Piso, the most brilliant and imaginative of its 
kind, becomes wearisome from want of ease and relief. 
His laudatory orations, on the other hand, are among 
his happiest efforts. Nothing can exceed the taste and 
beauty of those for the Manilian Law, for Marcellus, 



222 PBOSE AND POETEY OF NEWMAN 

for Ligarius, for Archias, and the ninth Philippic, 
which is principally in praise of Servius Sulpicius. 
But it is in judicial eloquence, particularly on subjects 
of a lively cast, as in his speeches for Caelius and 
Muraena, and against Caecilius, that his talents are 
displayed to the best advantage. In both these depart- 
ments of oratory the grace and amiableness of his gen- 
ius are manifested in their full lustre, though none of 
his orations are without tokens of those characteristic 
excellences. Historical allusions, philosophical senti- 
ments, descriptions full of life and nature, and polite 
raillery, succeed each other in the most agreeable man- 
ner, without appearance of artifice or effort. Such are 
his pictures of the confusion of the Catilinarian con- 
spirators on detection ; ^ of the death of Metellus ; ^ of 
Sulpicius undertaking the embassy to Antony ; ^ the 
character he draws of Catiline ; * and his fine sketch 
of old Appius, frowning on his degenerate descendant 
Clodia.^ 

These, however, are but incidental and occasional 
artifices to divert and refresh the mind, since his Ora- 
tions are generally laid out according to the plan pro- 
posed in rhetorical works; the introduction, containing 
the ethical proof, the body of the speech, the argument, 
and the peroration addressing itself to the passions of 
the judges. In opening his case, he commonly makes 
a profession of timidity and diffidence, with a view to 
conciliate the favour of his audience ; the eloquence, 
for instance, of Hortensius, is so powerful,^ or so much 
prejudice has been excited against his client,^ or it is 

1 In Catil. iii, 3-5. 2 p^o CaeL 24. ^ PMlipp ix, 3. 

4 Pro CaeL 6. « Ibid. 14. 

^ Pro QuincL 1, and In Verr, Act i, 13. ' Pro Cluent. 1. 



MARCUS TULLIUS CICEBO 223 

his first appearance in tlie rostrum,^ or he is unused to 
speak in an armed assembly,^ or to plead in a private 
apartment.^ He proceeds to entreat the patience of 
his judges ; drops out some generous or popular senti- 
ment, or contrives to excite prejudice against his oppo- 
nent. He then states the circumstances of his case, 
and the intended plan of his oration ; and here he is 
particularly clear. But it is when he comes actually to 
prove his point that his oratorical powers begin to have 
their full play. He accounts for everything so natu- 
rally, makes trivial circumstances tell so happily, so 
adroitly converts apparent objections into confirmations 
of his argument, connects independent facts with such 
ease and plausibility, that it becomes impossible to en- 
tertain a question on the truth of his statement. This 
is particularly observable in his defence of Cluentius, 
where prejudices, suspicions, and difficulties are en- 
countered with the most triumphant ingenuity : in the 
antecedent probabilities of his Pro Milone; * in his apo- 
logy for Muraena's public,^ and Caelius's private life,* 
and his disparagement of Verres's military services in 
Sicily ; ^ it is observable too in the address with which 
the Agrarian Law of RuUus,^ and the accusation of 
Rabirius,^ both popular measures, are represented to be 
hostile to public liberty; with which Milo's impolitic 
unconcern is made a touching incident ; ^^ and Cato's 
attack upon the crowd of clients which accompanied 
the candidate for office, a tyrannical disregard for the 

^ Pro Leg. Manil. 1. 2 Pj.q Milon. 1. 

3 Pro Deiotar. 2. ^ Pro Milon. 14, etc. 

^ Pro Muraen. 9. ® Pro Cael. 7, etc. 

7 In Verr. vi, 2, etc. * Contra Rull. ii, 6, 7. 

^ Pro Rdbir. 4, ^° Pro Milon. init. et alibi. 



224 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

feelings of the poor J So great indeed is his talent 
that he even hurts a good cause by an excess of plausi- 
bility. 

But it is not enough to have barely proved his point ; 
he proceeds, either immediately, or towards the conclu- 
sion of his speech, to heighten the effect by amplifica- 
tion.^ Here he goes (as it were) round and round his 
object ; surveys it in every light ; examines it in all 
its parts ; retires, and then advances ; turns and re- 
turns it ; compares and contrasts it ; illustrates, con- 
firms, enforces his view of the question, till at last the 
hearer feels ashamed of doubting a position which 
seems built on a foundation so strictly argumentative. 
Of this nature is his justification of Rabirius in tak- 
ing up arms against Saturninus ; ^ his account of the 
imprisonment of the Roman citizens by Verres, and of 
the crucifixion of Gavius ; * his comparison of Antony 
with Tarquin ; ^ and the contrast he draws of Verres 
with Fabius, Scipio, and Marius.^ 

And now, having established his case, he opens upon 
his opponent a discharge of raillery, so delicate and 
good-natured, that it is impossible for the latter to 
maintain his ground against it. Or where the subject 
is too grave to admit this, he colours his exaggeration 
with all the bitterness of irony or vehemence of passion. 
Such are his frequent delineations of Gabinius, Piso, 
Clodius, and Antony ; "^ particularly his vivid and 
almost humorous contrast of the two consuls, who 

1 Pro Muraen, 34. ^ j)^ Q^at. Partit. 8, 16, 17. 

3 Pro Rahir. 8. ^ In Verr, v, 56, etc., and 64, etc. 

^ Philipp. iii, 4. ^ In Verr. vi, 10. 

7 Post Redit. in SenaL i, 4-8 ; Pro Dom. 9, 39, etc.; In Pis. 
10, 11; Philipp. ii, 18, etc. 



MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 225 

sanctioned his banishment, in his oration for Sextius.^ 
Such the celebrated account (already referred to) of 
the crucifixion of Gavins by Verres, which it is diffi- 
cult to read, even at the present day, without having 
our feelings roused against the merciless Praetor. But 
the appeal to the gentler emotions of the soul is re- 
served (perhaps with somewhat of sameness) for the 
close of his oration ; as in his defence of Cluentius, 
Muraena, Caelius, Milo, Sylla, Flaccus, and Rabirius 
Postumus; the most striking instances of which are 
the poetical burst of feeling with which he addresses 
his client Plancus,^ and his picture of the desolate 
condition of the Vestal Fonteia, should her brother be 
condemned.^ At other times his peroration contains 
more heroic and elevated sentiments ; as in his invoca- 
tion of the Alban groves and altars in the peroration 
of the Pro Milone^ the panegyric on patriotism, and 
the love of glory in his defence of Sextius, and that 
on liberty at the close of the third and tenth Philippics.* 

But it is by the invention of a style which adapts 
itself with singular felicity to every class of subjects, 
whether lofty or familiar, philosophical or forensic, 
that Cicero answers even more exactly to his own de- 
finition of a perfect orator ^ than by his plausibility, 
pathos, and brilliancy. It is not, however, here intended 
to enter upon the consideration of a subject so ample 
and so familiar to all scholars as Cicero's diction, much 

1 Pro Sext. 8-10. 2 pj.^ pianc. 41, 43. ^ p^.^ Fonteia, 17. 

'* Vide his ideal description of an orator, in Orat. 40. Vide also 
De Clar. Orat. 93, his negative panegyric on his own oratorical 
attainments. 

5 Orat, 29. 



226 PBOSE AND POETBY OF NEWMAN 

less to take an extended view of it throuo:h the ransfe 
of his philosophical writings and familiar correspond- 
ence. Among many excellences, the greatest is its 
suitableness to the genius of the Latin language ; 
though the diffuseness thence necessarily resulting has 
exposed it, both in his own days and since his time, to 
the criticisms of those who have affected to condemn 
its Asiatic character, in comparison with the simplicity 
of Attic writers, and the strength of Demosthenes.^ 
Greek, however, is celebrated for its copiousness in 
vocabulary, for its perspicuity, and its reproductive 
power ; and its consequent facility of expressing the 
most novel or abstruse ideas with precision and elegance. 
Hence the Attic style of eloquence was plain and sim- 
ple, because simplicity and plainness were not incom- 
patible with clearness, energy, and harmony. But it was 
a singular want of judgment, an ignorance of the very 
principles of composition, which induced Brutus, Cal- 
vus, Sallust, and others to imitate this terse and severe 
beauty in their own defective language, and even to 
pronounce the opposite kind of diction deficient in taste 
and purity. In Greek, indeed, the words fall, as it 
were, naturally, into a distinct and harmonious order ; 
and, from the exuberant richness of the materials, 
less is left to the ingenuity of the artist. But the 
Latin language is comparatively weak, scanty, and 
unmusical ; and requires considerable skill and manage- 
ment to render it expressive and graceful. Simplicity 
in Latin is scarcely separable from baldness ; and justly 
as Terence is celebrated for chaste and unadorned dic- 
tion, yet, even he, compared with Attic writers, is flat 
and heavy. 2 Again, the perfection of strength is clear- 

^ Tusc. Quaest. i, 1; De Clar. Oral. 82, etc. ; De Opt, Gen. Dicendi. 
2 Quinct. X, 1. 



MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 227 

ness united to brevity ; but to this combination Latin is 
utterly unequal. From the vagueness and uncertainty 
of meaning which characterises its separate words, to 
be perspicuous it must be full. What Livy, and much 
more Tacitus, have gained in energy, they have lost in 
lucidity and elegance ; the correspondence of Brutus 
with Cicero is forcible, indeed, but harsh and abrupt. 
Latin, in short, is not a philosophical language, not 
a language in which a deep thinker is likely to express 
himself with purity or neatness. Cicero found it barren 
and dissonant, and as such he had to deal with it. 
His good sense enabled him to perceive what could be 
done, and what it was in vain to attempt ; and happily 
his talents answered precisely to the purpose required. 
He may be compared to a clever landscape-gardener, 
who gives depth and richness to narrow and confined 
premises by ingenuity and skill in the disposition of his 
trees and walks. Terence and Lucretius had cultivated 
simplicity; Cotta, Brutus, and Calvus had attempted 
strength; but Cicero rather made a language than a 
style ; yet not so much by the invention as by the com- 
bination of words. Some terms, indeed, his philosoph- 
ical subjects obliged him to coin ; ^ but his great art lies 
in the application of existing materials, in converting the 
very disadvantages of the language into beauties,^ in 
enriching it with circumlocutions and metaphors, in 
pruning it of harsh and uncouth expressions, in system- 
atizing the structure of a sentence.^ This is that copia 

1 De Fin. iii, 1 and 4 ; LuculL 6; Plutarch, In Vita. 

2 This, which is analogous to his address in pleading, is no- 
where more observable than in his rendering the recurrence of 
the same word, to which he is forced by the barrenness or vague- 
ness of the language, an elegance. 

^ It is remarkable that some authors attempted to account for 



228 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

dicendi which gained Cicero the high testimony of 
Caesar to his inventive powers,^ and which, we may 
add, constitutes him the greatest master of composition 
that the world has seen. 

Such, then, are the principal characteristics of 
Cicero's oratory ; on a review of which we may, with 
some reason, conclude that Roman eloquence stands 
scarcely less indebted to his works than Roman philo- 
sophy. For, though in his De Claris Oratorihus he 
begins his review from the age of Junius Brutus, yet, 
soberly speaking (and as he seems to allow in the open- 
ing of the De Orator e)^ we cannot assign an earlier 
date to the rise of eloquence among his countrymen 
than that of the same Athenian embassy which intro- 
duced the study of philosophy. To aim, indeed, at 
persuasion by appeals to the reason or passions is so 
natural that no country, whether refined or barbarous, 
is without its orators. If, however, eloquence be the 
mere power of persuading, it is but a relative term, 
limited to time and place, connected with a particular 
audience, and leaving to posterity no test of its 
merits but the report of those whom it has been suc- 
cessful in influencing ; but we are speaking of it as 
the subject-matter of an art.^ 

the invention of the Asiatic style, on the same principle we have 
here adduced to account for Cicero's adoption of it in Latin ; viz. 
that the Asiatics had a defective knowledge of Greek, and de- 
vised phrases, etc., to make up for the imperfection of their 
scanty vocabulary. See Quinct. xii, 10. 

1 De Clar. Orai. 72. 

2 "Yulgus interdum," says Cicero, " non probandum oratorem 
probat, sed probat sine comparatione, cum a mediocri aut etiam 
a malo delectatur ; eo est contentus : esse melius sentit: illud quod 
est, qualecunque est, probat." — De Clar. Oral, 52. 



MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 229 

The eloquence of Carneades and liis associates had 
made (to use a familiar term) a great sensation among 
the Roman orators, who soon split into two parties, 
— the one adhering to the rough, unpolished manners 
of their forefathers, the other favouring the artificial 
graces which distinguished the Grecian rhetoricians. 
In the former class were Cato and Laelius,^ both men 
of cultivated minds, particularly Cato, whose opposi- 
tion to Greek literature was founded solely on political 
considerations. But, as might have been expected, 
the Athenian cause had prevailed ; and Carbo and the 
two Gracchi, who are the principal orators of the next 
generation, are praised as masters of an oratory learned, 
majestic, and harmonious in its character.^ These 
were succeeded by Antonius, Crassus, Cotta, Sulpicius, 
and Hortensius ; who, adopting greater liveliness and 
variety of manner, form a middle age in the history 
of Roman eloquence. But it was in that which imme- 
diately followed that the art was adorned by an 
assemblage of orators which even Greece will find it 
difficult to match. Of these Caesar, Cicero, Curio, 
Brutus, Caelius, Calvus, and Callidius are the most 
celebrated. The talents, indeed, of Caesar were not 
more conspicuous in arms than in his style, which was 
noted for its force and purity.^ Caelius, whom Cicero 
brought forward into public life, excelled in natural 
quickness, loftiness of sentiment, and politeness in 
attack;^ Brutus in philosophical gravity, though he 
sometimes indulged himself in a warmer and bolder 
style.^ CalHdius was delicate and harmonious; Curio, 

1 De Clar. Orat. 72; QuincU xii, 10. 

2 De Clar. OraL 25, 27 ; Pro Harusp. Resp. 19. 

3 QuincL X, 1 and 2; De Clar. Orat. 75. 

^ De Clar. Orat. 75. ^ Ihid. and Ad Atticum, xiv, 1. 



230 PROSE AND POETBY OF NEWMAN 

bold and flowing ; Calvus, from studied opposition to 
Cicero's peculiarities, cold, cautious, and accurate.^ 
Brutus and Calvus have been before noticed as the 
advocates of the dry, sententious mode of speaking, 
which they dignified by the name of Attic ; a kind of 
eloquence which seems to have been popular from the 
comparative facility with which it was attained. 

In the Ciceronian age the general character of the 
oratory was dignified and graceful. The popular na- 
ture of the government gave opportunities for effective 
appeals to the passions ; and, Greek literature being 
as yet a novelty, philosophical sentiments were intro- 
duced with corresponding success. The republican 
orators were long in their introductions, diffuse in 
their statements, ample in their divisions, frequent in 
their digressions, gradual and sedate in their perora- 
tions.2 Under the Emperors, however, the people 
were less consulted in state affairs ; and the judges, 
instead of possessing an almost independent authority, 
being but delegates of the executive, from interested 
politicians became men of business ; literature, too, 
was now familiar to all classes ; and taste began sensi- 
bly to decline. The national appetite felt a craving 
for stronger and more stimulating compositions. Im- 
patience was manifested at the tedious majesty and 
formal graces, the parade of arguments, grave sayings, 
and shreds of philosophy,^ which characterized their 

A De Clar. Drat 75. 

2 Dialog, de Drat. 20 apud Tacit, and 22; Quinct. x, 2. 

3 ** It is not uncommon for those who have grown wise by the 
labour of others, to add a little of their own, and overlook their 
master." — Johnson. We have before compared Cicero to Addi- 
son as regards the purpose of inspiring their respective country- 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 231 

fathers ; and a smarter and more sparkling kind of 
oratory succeeded,^ just as in our own country the 
minuet of the last century has been supplanted by 
the quadrille, and the stately movements of Giardini 
have given way to Kossini's brisker and more artificial 
melodies. Corvinus, even before the time of Augus- 
tus, had shown himself more elaborate and fastidious 
in his choice of expressions.^ Cassius Severus, the first 
who openly deviated from the old style of oratory, 
introduced an acrimonious and virulent mode of plead- 
ing.^ It now became the fashion to decry Cicero as 
inflated, languid, tame, and even deficient in orna- 
ment ; ^ Maecenas and Gallio followed in the career 
of degeneracy ; till flippancy of attack, prettiness of 
expression, and glitter of decoration prevailed over the 
bold and manly eloquence of free Rome. 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 

One of the first things told us of him (St. Philip) 
in his very childhood is, that '' he never spoke lightly, 
as boys do, of becoming a priest or a religious ; he 
concealed the wish of his heart, and from childhood 
upwards he eschewed display, of which he ever had 
a special hatred." Things which other saints have 
allowed in themselves, or rather have felt a duty, he 
could not abide. He did not ask to be opposed, to be 
maligned, to be persecuted, but simply to be over- 
looked, to be despised. Neglect was the badge which 

men with literary taste. Thej resembled each other in the 
return they experienced. 

1 Dialog. 18. 2 Dialog. 18. 3 Dialog. 19. 

^ Dialog. 18 and 22; Quinct. xii, 10. 



232 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

he desired for himself and for his own. " To despise 
the whole world," he said, " to despise no member of 
it, to despise one's self, to despise being despised.'^ He 
took great pleasure in being undervalued and made 
little of, according to the Apostle's sentiment, " If any 
man among you seem to be wise, let him become 
a fool, that he may be wise." And hence, you know, 
when he became so famous in his old age, and every 
one was thinking of him mysteriously, and looking at 
him with awe, and solemnly repeating Father Philip's 
words and rehearsing Father Philip's deeds, and bring- 
ing strangers to see him, it was the most cruel of 
penances to him, and he was ever behaving himself 
ridiculously on purpose, and putting them out, from 
his intense hatred and impatience of being turned into 
a show. " He was always trying," says his biographer, 
" either by gestures, or motions, or words, or some 
facetious levity, to hide his great devotion ; and when 
he had done any virtuous action, he would do some- 
thing simple to cover it." 

This being the disposition of St. Philip, you will 
understand how it was that while he wished to do the 
very work which Savonarola intended, he set about it, 
not on principle merely, but on instinctive feeling, in 
so different a way. Here, as in other cases, the slow- 
est way was the surest, and the most quiet the most 
effectual ; and he rather would not have attempted that 
work at all than have sacrificed his humility and mod- 
esty to the doing of it. Accordingly he, whose mission 
was to Popes, Cardinals, and nobles, to philosophers, 
authors, and artists, began with teaching the poor who 
are found about the doors of the Roman churches. 
This was his occupation for years ; soon he added to 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAEOLA 233 

it another undertaking of tlie same kind. He used 
to go about the squares, shops, warehouses, schools, 
and shop-counters, " talking with all sorts of persons 
in a most engaging way about spiritual things, and 
saying, ' Well, my brothers, when are we to set about 
serving God, and doing good ? ' " and he began to 
make some great conversions. 

Rome was at that time in a very different state 
from what it was when Savonarola had discharged his 
threats upon it. A most heavy judgment had come 
upon it a few years before Philip arrived there, and 
that judgment had come in mercy upon the city of 
God's choice. The Germans and Spaniards had be- 
sieged, taken, and sacked it, with excesses and out- 
rages so horrible that it is thought to have suffered 
less from the Goths and Huns than from troops nomi- 
nally Christian. Its external splendour has never been 
recovered down to this day ; its churches were spoiled 
and defaced ; its convents plundered ; its cardinals, 
bishops, monks, and nuns treated with the most ex- 
treme indignities, and many of them murdered ; and 
sacrileges committed innumerable. People thought 
what happened was the fulfilment of the predictions 
of Savonarola ; but amid these miseries the grace of 
God spoke, and the guilty population was softened. 
First St. Cajetan, who was himself tortured by the 
ruffianly soldiers, had already begun to call to prayer 
and repentance ; St. Ignatius followed, preaching. 
Then came St. Philip, but in his own quiet way, like 
"the whispering of a gentle air," "his speech trick- 
ling like dew, as a shower upon the herb, and as 
drops upon the grass." 

He began, as I have said, with the poor ; then he 



234 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

went among shopmen, warehousemen, clerks in banks, 
and loungers in public places. Encouraged by these 
successes, he addressed himself to men, not merely of 
careless, but of the worst kind of lives, and them also 
he gained for God. His charity brought him into vari- 
ous situations of trial ; but when attempts were made 
upon his virtue, his zeal and devotion brought him 
through them. AU this time he was visiting the hos- 
pitals, and attending to the necessities, both bodily and 
spiritual, of the sick. 

This had been his life, in some degree, before he left 
his retreat in the basilicas and cemeteries ; audit lasted 
altogether ten years. At the end of them he joined 
a small community of pious people, in number fifteen, 
" simple and poor," we are told, " but full of spirit and 
devotion," and " inflaming one another, by words and 
by example, with the desire of Christian perfection." 
Philip, though still a layman, preached: and, because 
he was doing an unusual thing, dissolute youths came 
to make game of him ; but it was dangerous for such to 
come near him ; on one occasion he converted thirty 
of them by a single sermon. He and his associates 
made it their duty to attend on the pilgrims, and on 
the sick who had left the hospitals, convalescent, but 
not recovered. Thus his work gradually extended ; for 
these pilgrims and sick were from all countries, and 
many of them were Jews or heretics, whom he brought 
into the fold of the Church. 

He had been fifteen years in Rome before he was 
ordained ; and then at length, on his receiving facul- 
ties for hearing confessions, he began, at the age of 
thirty-five, his real mission, — that long course of min- 
istry, which, carried on for years three times fifteen, 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 235 

down almost to the hour of his death, has gained for 
him the title of Apostle of Rome. 

You know, my brethren, what is commonly meant 
by an Apostle of a country. It means one who con- 
verts its heathen inhabitants to the Christian faith, 
such as St. Augustine of England ; accordingly, his 
proper function is Baptism. Hence you find St. Au- 
gustine, St. Patrick, St. Boniface, or St. Francis 
baptizing their hundreds and thousands. This was the 
office to which St. Philip wished to minister in India ; 
but it was his zeal and charity that urged him, not 
his mature judgment ; for the fierce conflicts, and the 
pastoral cares, and the rude publicity of such exalted 
duties were unsuited to his nature ; so he was kept 
at home for a different work. He was kept at home, 
in the very heart of Christendom, not to evangelize, 
but to recover ; and his instrument of conversion was, 
not Baptism, but Penance. The Confessional was the 
seat and seal of his peculiar Apostolate. Hence, as St. 
Francis Xavier baptized his tens of thousands, Philip 
was, every day and almost every hour, for forty-five 
years, restoring, teaching, encouraging, and guiding 
penitents along the narrow way of salvation. 

We are told in his Life that " he abandoned every 
other care, and gave himself to hearing confessions." 
Not content with the day, he gave up a considerable 
portion of the night to it also. Before dawn he had 
generally confessed a good number. When he retired 
to his room, he still confessed every one who came ; 
though at prayers, though at meals, he broke off in- 
stantly, and attended to the call. When the church 
was opened at daybreak, he went down to the Confes- 
sional, and remained in it till noon, when he said Mass. 



236 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

When no penitents came, lie remained near his Con- 
fessional ; he never intermitted hearing confessions for 
any illness. " On the day of his death he began to hear 
confessions very early in the morning ; " after Mass 
" again he went into the Confessional ; " in the after- 
noon, and " during the rest of the day down to supper 
time," he heard confessions. After supper, " he heard 
the confessions of those Fathers who were to say the 
first Masses on the following morning," when he him- 
self was no longer to be on earth. It was this extra- 
ordinary persevering service in so trying, so wearing 
a duty, for forty-five years, that enabled him to be the 
new Apostle of the Sacred City. Thus it was, as the 
lesson in his Office says, that ''he bore innumerable 
children to Christ." He was ever suffering their mis- 
eries, and fighting with their sins, and travailing with 
their good resolves, year after year, whatever their 
state of life, their calling, their circumstances, if so be 
that he might bring them safe to heaven, with a super- 
human, heroic patience, of which we see so few traces 
in the fiery preacher at Florence. 

Savonarola, in spite of his personal sanctity, in spite 
of his protests against a mere external sanctity in 
Catholics, after all, began with an external reform ; 
he burned lutes and guitars, looking-glasses and masks, 
books and pictures, in the public square : but Philip 
bore with every outside extravagance in those whom 
he addressed, as far as it was not directly sinful, know- 
ing well that if the heart was once set right, the ap- 
propriate demeanour would follow. You recollect how 
a youth came to his Exercises one day, dressed out " in 
a most singular and whimsical fashion ; " and how 
Philip did but fix his eyes on him, and proceed with 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONABOLA 237 

the discourses and devotions of the Oratory, and how, 
by the time that they were at an end, the poor sinner 
had become quite another man ; his nature was changed 
all at once, and he became one of the Saint's most 
fervent penitents. A rich ecclesiastic came to him in 
coloured clothes, like a layman : Philip talked with 
him for a fortnight, without saying a word about his 
dress. At the end of the time he put it off of his own 
accord, and made a general confession. His biographer 
says : " He was very much against stiffness and off- 
hand prohibitions about wearing fine clothes, collars, 
swords, and such-like things, saying that if only a little 
devotion gained admittance into their hearts, you might 
leave them to themselves." If he spoke of them, it was 
good-naturedly and playfully. You recollect he said to 
a lady, who asked if it was a sin to wear slippers with 
very high heels, according to an excessive fashion of 
the day, " Take care they do not trip you up." And to 
a youth, who wore one of those large, stiff frills, which 
we see in pictures, he remarked, " I should caress you 
much more, if your collar did not hurt me." 

Savonarola is associated in our minds with the pul- 
pit rather than the Confessional: his vehemence con- 
verted many, but frightened or irritated more. The 
consequences came back upon himself and his peni- 
tents. Some of his convert artists were assassinated, 
others were driven into exile, others gave up their 
profession altogether in disgust or despair. Philip had 
no vocation, and little affection, for the pulpit; he was 
jealous of what the world calls eloquence, and he mor- 
tified his disciples when they aspired to it. One he 
interrupted and sent down; another he made preach 
his sermons six times over: he discoursed and con- 



238 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

versed rather than preached. And " he could not 
endure harsh rebukes," says the writer of his life, "or 
anything like rigour. He allured men to the service of 
God so dexterously, and with such a holy, winning art, 
that those who saw it cried out, astonished: 'Father 
Philip draws souls as the magnet draws iron.' He so 
accommodated himself to the temper of each, as, in 
the words of the Apostle, to become ' all things to all 
men, that he might gain all.' " And his love of them 
individually was so tender and ardent that, e^en in 
extreme old age, he was anxious to suffer for their 
sins ; and " for this end he inflicted on himself severe 
disciplines, and he reckoned their misdeeds as his 
own, and wept for them as such." I do not read that 
Savonarola acted thus towards Pope Alexander the 
Sixth, whom he so violently denounced. 

It is not surprising that, with this tenderness, with 
this prudence, and with the zeal and charity to which 
both were subordinate, his influence increased year by 
year till he gained a place in the heart of the Roman 
population which he has never lost. There are those 
whose greatest works are their earliest; there are 
others, who, at first scarcely distinguishable from a 
whole class who look the same, distance them in the 
long run, and do more and more wonderful works the 
longer they live. Philip was thirty-five before he was 
ordained ; forty, before he began his exercises in his 
room ; fifty, before he had a church ; sixty, before he 
formed his disciples into a congregation ; near seventy, 
before he put himself at the head of it. As the 
Blessed Virgin's name has by a majestic growth ex- 
panded and extended itself through the Church, 
'^ taking root in an honourable people, and resting in 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 239 

the Holy City," so tlie influence of Philip was, at the 
end of many years, paramount in that place which he 
had so long dwelt in as an obscure, disregarded 
stranger. Sharp eyes and holy sympathies indeed had 
detected " Philip Neri, as a saint living in caves," 
when he was a youth ; but it required half a century to 
develop this truth to the intelligence of the multitude 
of men. At length there was no possibility of mis- 
taking it. Visitors to Rome discerned the presence of 
one who was greater than Pope and Cardinals, holy, 
venerable, and vigilant as the rulers of the Church then 
were. "Among all the wonderful things which I saw 
in Rome," says one of them, writing when Philip was 
turned fifty, "I took the chief pleasure in beholding 
the multitude of devout and spiritual persons who 
frequented the Oratory. Amid the monuments of 
antiquity, the superb palaces and courts of so many 
illustrious lords, it appeared to me that the glory 
of this exemplar shone forth with surpassing light." 
"I go," says another visitor, ten years later, ''to the 
Oratory, where they deliver every day most beautiful 
discourses on the gospel, or on the virtues and vices, 
or ecclesiastical history, or the lives of the Saints. 
Persons of distinction go to hear them, bishops, pre- 
lates, and the like. They who deliver them are in 
holy orders, and of most exemplary life. Their su- 
perior is a certain Reverend Father Philip, an old 
man of sixty, who, they say, is an oracle, not only in 
Rome, but in the far-off parts of Italy, and of France 
and Spain, so that many come to him for counsel ; 
indeed he is another Thomas a Kempis, or Tauler." 

But it required to live in Rome to understand what 
his influence really was. Nothing was too high for 



240 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

him, nothing too low. He taught poor begging women 
to use mental prayer ; he took out boys to play ; he 
protected orphans ; he acted as novice-master to the 
children of St. Dominic. He was the teacher and di- 
rector of artisans, mechanics, cashiers in banks, mer- 
chants, workers in gold, artists, men of science. He 
was consulted by monks, canons, lawyers, physicians, 
courtiers ; ladies of the highest rank, convicts going 
to execution, engaged in their turn his solicitude and 
prayers. Cardinals hung about his room, and Popes 
asked for his miraculous aid in disease, and his minis- 
trations in death. It was his mission to save men, not 
from, but in, the world. To break the haughtiness of 
rank, and the fastidiousness of fashion, he gave his 
penitents public mortifications ; to draw the young from 
the theatres, he opened his Oratory of Sacred Music ; 
to rescue the careless from the Carnival and its ex- 
cesses, he set out in pilgrimage to the Seven Basilicas. 
For those who loved reading, he substituted, for the 
works of chivalry or the hurtful novels of the day, 
the true romance and the celestial poetry of the Lives 
of the Saints. He set one of his disciples to write his- 
tory against the heretics of that age ; another, to treat 
of the Notes of the Church ; a third, to undertake the 
Martyrs and Christian Antiquities ; — for, while in the 
discourses and devotions of the Oratory he prescribed 
the simplicity of the primitive monks, he wished his 
children, individually and. in private, to cultivate all 
their gifts to the full. He, however, was, after all and 
in all, their true model, — the humble priest, shrink- 
ing from every kind of dignity, or post, or office, and 
living the greater part of day and night in prayer, in 
his room or upon the housetop. 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 241 

And when he died, a continued stream of people, 
says his biographer, came to see his body, during the 
two days that it remained in the church, kissing his 
bier, touching him with their rosaries or their rings, or 
taking away portions of his hair, or the flowers which 
were strewed over him ; and, among the crowd, per- 
sons of every rank and condition were heard lament- 
ing and extolling one who was so lowly, yet so great; 
who had been so variously endowed, and had been the 
pupil of so many saintly masters ; who had the breadth 
of view of St. Dominic, the poetry of St. Benedict, 
the wisdom of St. Ignatius, and all recommended by 
an unassuming grace and a winning tenderness which 
were his own. 

Would that we, his children of this Oratory, were 
able — I do not say individually, but even collectively, 
nor in some one generation, but even in that whole 
period during which it is destined to continue here — 
would that we were able to do a work such as his ! At 
least we may take what he was for our pattern, what- 
ever be the standard of our powers and the measure 
of our success. And certainly it is a consolation that 
thus much we can say in our own behalf, — that we 
have gone about his work in the way most likely to 
gain his blessing upon us, because most like his own. 
We have not chosen for ourselves any scene of exertion 
where we might make a noise, but have willingly taken 
that humble place of service which our Superiors chose 
for us. The desire of our hearts and our duty went to- 
gether here. We have deliberately set ourselves down 
in a populous district, unknown to the great world, 
and have commenced, as St. Philip did, by ministering 
chiefly to the poor and lowly. We have gone where 



242 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

we could get no reward from society for our deeds, nor 
admiration from the acute or learned for our words. 
We have determined, through God's mercy, not to 
have the praise or the popularity that the world can 
give, but, according to our Father's own precept, " to 
love to be unknown." 

May this spirit ever rule us more and more ! For 
me, my dear Fathers of the Oratory, did you ask me, 
and were I able, to gain some boon for you from St. 
Philip, which might distinguish you and your success- 
ors for the time to come, persecution I would not dare 
to supplicate for you, as holy men have sometimes sup- 
plicated; for the work of the Oratory is a tranquil 
work, and requires peace and security to do it well. 
Nor would I ask for you calumny and reproach, for to 
be slandered is to be talked about, and to some minds 
notoriety itself is a gratification and a snare. But I 
would beg for you this privilege, that the public world 
might never know you for praise or for blame, that 
you should do a good deal of hard work in your gen- 
eration, and prosecute many useful labours, and effect 
a number of religious purposes, and send many souls 
to heaven, and take men by surprise, how much you 
were really doing, when they happened to come near 
enough to see it ; but that by the world you should be 
overlooked, that you should not be known out of your 
place, that you should work for God alone with a pure 
heart and single eye, without the distractions of human 
applause, and should make Him your sole hope, and 
His eternal heaven your sole aim, and have your re- 
ward, not partly here, but fully and entirely hereafter. 

Blessed shall you and I be, my dear Fathers, if we 
learn to live now in the presence of Saints and Angels, 



ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 243 

who are to be our everlasting companions hereafter. 
Blessed are we, if we converse habitually with Jesus, 
Mary, and Joseph, — with the Apostles, Martyrs, and 
great Fathers of the early Church, — with Sebastian, 
Laurence, and Cecilia, — with Athanasius, Ambrose, 
and Augustine, — with Philip, whose children we are, 
— with our guardian angels and our patron saints, 
careless what men think about us, so that their scorn 
of us involves no injury to our community, and their 
misconception of us is no hindrance to their own 
conversion. — From Sermons Preached on Various 
Occasions. 



VI 

SELECTIONS FROM "CALLISTA" 

THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 

In the bosom of the woods which stretched for 
many miles from the immediate environs of Sicca, 
and placed on a gravel slope which reached down to 
a brook, which ran in a bottom close by, was a small, 
rude •hut, of a kind peculiar to Africa, and commonly 
ascribed to the wandering tribes, who neither cared, 
nor had leisure, for a more stable habitation. Some 
might have called it a tent, from the goat's-hair cloth 
with which it was covered ; but it looked, as to shape, 
like nothing else than an inverted boat, or the roof of 
a house set upon the ground. Inside it was seen to be 
constructed of the branches of trees, twisted together 
or wattled, the interstices, or rather the whole surface, 
being covered with clay. Being thus stoutly built, 
lined, and covered, it was proof against the tremen- 
dous rains, to which the climate, for which it was made, 
was subject. Along the centre ridge or backbone, 
which varied in height from six to ten feet from the 
ground, it was supported by three posts or pillars ; at 
one end it rose conically to an open aperture, which 
served for chimney, for window, and for the purposes 
of ventilation. Hooks were suspended from the roof 
for baskets, articles of clothing,, weapons, and imple- 
ments of various kinds ; and a second cone, excavated 
in the ground with the vertex downward, served as a 
storehouse for grain. The door was so low that an 
ordinary person must bend double to pass through it. 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 245 

However, it was in the winter months only, when 
the rains were profuse, that the owner of this respect- 
able mansion condescended to creep into it. In sum- 
mer she had a drawing-room, as it may be called, of 
nature's own creation, in which she lived, and in one 
quarter of which she had her lair. Close above the 
hut was a high plot of level turf, surrounded by old 
oaks, and fringed beneath with thick underwood. In 
the centre of this green rose a yew-tree of primaeval 
character. Indeed, the whole forest spoke of the very 
beginnings of the world, as if it had been the im- 
mediate creation of that Voice which bade the earth 
clothe itself with green life. But the place no longer 
spoke exclusively of its Maker. Upon the trees hung 
the emblems and objects of idolatry, and the turf was 
traced with magical characters. Littered about were 
human bones, horns of wild animals, wax figures, 
spermaceti taken from vaults, large nails, to which 
portions of flesh adhered, as if they had had to do 
with malefactors, metal plates engraved with strange 
characters, bottled blood, hair of young persons, and 
old rags. The reader must not suppose any incanta- 
tion is about to follow, or that the place we are de- 
scribing will have a prominent place in what remains 
of our tale ; but even if it be the scene of only one 
conversation, and one event, there is no harm in de- 
scribing it, as it appeared on that occasion. 

The old crone, who was seated in this bower of 
delight, had an expression of countenance in keeping, 
not with the place, but with the furniture with which 
it was adorned : that furniture told her trade. Whether 
the root of superstition might be traced deeper still, 
and the woman and her traps were really and directly 



24C PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

connected with the powers beneath the earth, it is 
impossible to determine : it is certain she had the will, 
it is certain that that will was from their inspiration ; 
naj^, it is certain that she thought she really possessed 
the communications which she desired ; it is certain, 
too, she so far deceived herself as to fancy that what 
she learned by mere natural means came to her from 
a diabolical source. She kept up an active correspond- 
ence with Sicca. She was consulted by numbers : she 
was up with the public news, the social gossip, and 
the private and secret transactions of the hour ; and 
had, before now, even interfered in matters of state, 
and had been courted by rival political parties. But 
in the high cares and occupations of this interest- 
ing person, we are not here concerned ; but with a con- 
versation which took place between her and Juba, 
about the same hour of the evening as that of Caecil- 
ius's escape, but on the day after it, while the sun was 
gleaming almost horizontally through the tall trunks 
of the trees of the forest. 

" Well, my precious boy," said the old woman, '' the 
choicest gifts of great Cham be your portion ! You 
had excellent sport yesterday, I '11 warrant. The rats 
squeaked, eh? and you beat the life out of them. 
That scoundrel sacristan, I suppose, has taken up his 
quarters below." 

" You may say it," answered Juba. " The reptile ! 
he turned right about, and would have made himself 
an honest fellow, when it could n't be helped." 

'' Good, good ! " returned Gurta, as if she had got 
something very pleasant in her mouth ; " ah ! that 
is good ! but he did not escape on that score, I do 
trust." 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 247 

" They pulled him to pieces all the more cheerfully," 
said Juba. 

" Pulled him to pieces, limb by limb, joint by joint, 
eh?'' answered Gurta. "Did they skin him? — did 
they do anything to his eyes, or his tongue ? Any- 
how, it was too quickly, Juba. Slowly, leisurely, grad- 
ually. Yes, it 's like a glutton to be quick about it. 
Taste him, handle him, play with him, — that 's lux- 
ury ! but to bolt him, faugh ! " 

" Caeso's slave made a good end," said Juba : " he 
stood up for his views, and died like a man." 

" The gods smite him ! but he has gone up, — up : " 
and she laughed. "Up to what they call bliss and 
glory; — such glory! but he's out of their domain, 
you know. But he did not die easy ? " 

" The boys worried him a good deal," answered 
Juba : " but it 's not quite in my line, mother, all 
this. I think you drink a pint of blood morning and 
evening, and thrive on it, old woman. It makes you 
merry ; but it 's too much for my stomach." 

" Ha, ha, my boy ! " cried Gurta ; " you '11 improve 
in time, though you make wry faces, now that you 're 
young. Well, and have you brought me any news 
from the capitol? Is any one getting a rise in the 
world, or a downfall? How blows the wind? Are 
there changes in the camp? This Decius, I suspect, 
will not last long." 

" They all seem desperately frightened," said Juba, 
" lest they should not smite your friends hard enough, 
Gurta. Root and ^branch is the word. They'll have 
to make a few Christians for the occasion, in order to 
kill them: and I almost think they're about it," he 
added thoughtfully. " They have to show that they 



248 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

are not surpassed by the rabble. 'T is a pity Chris- 
tians are so few, is n't it, mother ? " 

" Yes, yes," she said ; " but we must crush them, 
grind them, many or few: and we shall, we shall! 
Callista 's to come." 

" I don't see they are worse than other people," 
said Juba ; " not at all, except that they are com- 
monly sneaks. If Callista turns, why should not I 
turn too, mother, to keep her company, and keep your 
hand in ? " 

" No, no, my boy," returned the witch ; " you must 
serve my master. You are having your fling just now, 
but you will buckle to in good time. You must one 
day take some work with my merry men. Come here, 
child," said the fond mother, ''and let me kiss you." 

" Keep your kisses for your monkeys, and goats, 
and cats," answered Juba : " they 're not to my taste, 
old dame. Master ! my master ! I won't have a mas- 
ter ! I '11 be nobody's servant. I '11 never stand to be 
hired, nor cringe to a bully, nor quake before a rod. 
Please yourself, Gurta ; I 'm a free man. You 're my 
mother by courtesy only." 

Gurta looked at him savagely. " Why, you 're not 
going to be pious and virtuous, Juba ? A choice saint 
you '11 make ! You shall be drawn for a picture." 

"Why shouldn't I, if I choose?" said Juba. "If 
I must take service, willynilly, I 'd any day prefer 
the other's to that of your friend. I 've not left the 
master to take the man." 

" Blaspheme not the great gods," ^he answered, " or 
they '11 do you a mischief yet." 

" I say again," insisted Juba, " if I must lick the 
earth, it shall not be where your friend has trod. It 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 249 

shall be In my brother's fashion, rather than in yours, 
Gurta." 

"Agellius! " she shrieked out with such disgust that 
It Is wonderful she uttered the name at all. ''Ah ! you 
have not told me about him, boy. Well, Is he safe in 
the pit, or in the stomach of an hyena? " 

" He 's alive," said Juba ; " but he has not got It in 
him to be a Christian. Yes, he 's safe with his uncle." 

"Ah! Jucundus must ruin him, debauch him, and 
then we must make away with him. We must not be 
in a hurry," said Gurta ; '' it must be body and soul." 

" No one shall touch him, craven as he is," answered 
Juba. " I despise him, but let him alone." 

" Don't come across me," said Gurta sullenly; ''I '11 
have my way. Why, you know I could smite you to 
the dust, as well as him. If I chose." 

" But you have not asked me about Calllsta," an- 
swered Juba. ''It Is really a capital joke, but she 
has got Into prison for certain, for being a Christian. 
Fancy It I they caught her In the streets, and put her 
In the guard-house, and have had her up for exam- 
ination. You see they want a Christian for the nonce : 
it would not do to have none such in prison ; so they 
will flourish with her till Declus bolts from the scene." 

" The furies have her ! " cried Gurta ; " she is a 
Christian, my boy ; I told you so, long ago." 

" Calllsta a Christian ! " answered Juba, " ha ! ha ! 
She and Agellius are going to make a match of It, of 
some sort or other. They 're thinking of other things 
than paradise." 

" She and the old priest, more likely, more likely," 
said Gurta. " He 's in prison with her, — In the pit, 
as I trust." 



250 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

"Your master has cheated you for once, old woman," 
said Juba. 

Gurta looked at him fiercely, and seemed waiting 
for his explanation. He began singing : — 

" She wheedled and coaxed^ but he was no fool ; 
He *d be his own master; he 'd not be her tool ; 
Not the little black moor should send him to school. 

" She foamed and she cursed, — 't was the same thing to him ; 
She laid well her trap; but he carried his whim : — - 
The priest scuffled off, safe in life and in limb." 

Gurta was almost suffocated with passion. " Cypri- 
anus has not escaped, boy ? " she asked at length. 

" I got him off," said Juba undauntedly. 

A shade, as of Erebus, passed over the witch's face ; 
but she remained quite silent. 

" Mother, I am my own master," he continued. " I 
must break your assumption of superiority. I 'm not 
a boy, though you call me so. I '11 have my own way. 
Yes, I saved Cyprianus. You 're a blood-thirsty old 
hag ! Yes, / ^ve seen your secret doings. Did not I 
catch you, the other day, practising on that little child ? 
You had nailed him up by hands and feet against 
the tree, and were cutting him to pieces at your 
leisure, as he quivered and shrieked the while. You 
were examining or using his liver for some of your 
black purposes. It 's not in my line ; but you gloated 
over it ; and when he wailed, you wailed in mimicry. 
You were panting with pleasure." 

Gurta was still silent, and had an expression on her 
face, awful from the intensity of its malignity. She 
had uttered a low piercing whistle. 

" Yes ! " continued Juba, " you revelled in it. You 
chattered to the poor babe, when it screamed, as a 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 251 

nurse to an infant. You called it pretty names, and 
squeaked out your satisfaction each time you stuck it. 
You old hag ! I 'm not of your breed, though they say 
I am of your blood. jT don't fear you," he said, observ- 
ing the expression of her countenance, " I don't fear 
the immortal devil ! " And he continued his song : — 

" She beckoned the moon, and the moon came down; 
The green earth shrivelled beneath her frown; 
But a man's strong will can keep his own." 

While he was talking and singing, her call had been 
answered from the hut. An animal of some wonderful 
species had crept out of it, and proceeded to creep and 
crawl, moeing and twisting as it went, along the trees 
and shrubs which rounded the grass plot. When it 
came up to the old woman, it crouched at her feet, and 
then rose up upon its hind legs and begged. She took 
hold of the uncouth beast and began to • fondle it in 
her arms, muttering something in its ear. At length, 
when Juba stopped for a moment in his song, she 
suddenly flung it right at him, with great force, say- 
ing, " Take that ! " She then gave utterance to a low 
inward laugh, and leaned herseK back against the 
trunk of the tree under which she was sitting, with her 
knees drawn up almost to her chin. 

The blow seemed to act on Juba as a shock on his 
nervous system, both from its violence and its strange- 
ness. He stood still for a moment, and then, without 
saying a word, he turned away, and walked slowly 
down the hill, as if in a maze. Then he sat down. . . . 

In an instant up he started again with a great cry, 
and began running at the top of his speed. He thought 
he heard a voice speaking in him ; and^ however fast 
he ran, the voice, or whatever it was, kept up with 



252 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

him. He rushed through the underwood, trampling 
and crushing it under his feet, and scaring the birds 
and small game which lodged there. At last, exhausted, 
he stood still for breath, when he heard it say loudly 
and deeply, as if speaking with his own organs, " You 
cannot escape from yourself ! " Then a terror seized 
him ; he fell down and fainted away. 

When his senses returned, his first impression was 
of something in him not of himself. He felt it in his 
breathing ; he tasted it in his mouth. The brook which 
ran by Gurta's encampment had by this time become 
a streamlet, though still shallow. He plunged into it ; a 
feeling came upon him as if he ought to drown himself, 
had it been deeper. He rolled about in it, in spite of 
its flinty and rocky bed. When he came out of it, his 
tunic sticking to him, he tore it off his shoulders, and 
let it hang rdund his girdle in shreds, as it might. The 
shock of the water, however, acted as a sedative upon 
him, and the coolness of the night refreshed him. He 
walked on for a while in silence. 

Suddenly the power within him began uttering, by 
means of his organs of speech, the most fearful blas- 
phemies, words embodying conceptions which, had they 
come into his mind, he might indeed have borne with 
patience before this, or uttered in bravado, but which 
now filled him with inexpressible loathing, and a terror 
to which he had hitherto been quite a stranger. He 
had always in his heart believed in a God, but he now 
believed with a reality and intensity utterly new to 
him. He felt it as if he saw Him ; he felt there was 
a world of good and evil beings. He did not love the 
good, or hate the evil ; but he shrank from the one, 
and he was terrified at the other ; and he felt himself 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 253 

carried away, against his will, as the prey of some 
dreadful, mysterious power, which tyrannized over him. 

The day had closed — the moon had risen. He 
plunged into the thickest wood, and the trees seemed 
to him to make way for him. Still they seemed to 
moan and to creak as they moved out of their place. 
Soon he began to see that they were looking at him, 
and exulting over his misery. They, of an inferior 
nature, had had no gift to abuse and lose ; and they 
remained in that honour and perfection in which they 
were created. Birds of the night flew out of them, rep- 
tiles slunk away ; yet soon he began to be surrounded, 
wherever he went, by a circle of owls, bats, ravens, 
crows, snakes, wildcats, and apes, which were always 
looking at him, but somehow made way, retreating 
before him, and yet forming again, and in order, as 
he marched along. 

He had passed through the wing of the forest which 
he entered, and penetrated into the more mountainous 
country. He ascended the heights; he was a taller, 
stronger man than he had been ; he went forward with 
a preternatural vigour, and flourished his arms with 
the excitement of some vinous or gaseous intoxication. 
He heard the roar of the wild beasts echoed along the 
woody ravines which were cut into the solid mountain 
rock, with a reckless feeling, as if he could cope with 
them. As he passed the dens of the lion, leopard, 
hyena, jackal, wild boar, and woK, there he saw them 
sitting at the entrance, or stopping suddenly as they 
prowled along, and eyeing him, but not daring to ap- 
proach. He strode along from rock to rock, and over 
precipices, with the certainty and ease of some giant 
in Eastern fable. Suddenly a beast of prey came across 



254 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

him ; in a moment he had torn up by the roots the 
stump of a wild vine plant, which was near him, had 
thrown himself upon his foe before it could act on the 
aggressive, had flung it upon its back, forced the weapon 
into its mouth, and was stamping on its chest. He 
knocked the life out of the furious animal ; and crying 
" Take that," tore its flesh, and, applying his mouth to 
the wound, sucked a draught of its blood. 

He has passed over the mountain, and has descended 
its side. Bristling shrubs, swamps, precipitous banks, 
rushing torrents, are no obstacle to his course. He 
has reached the brow of a hill, with a deep placid 
river at the foot of it, just as the dawn begins to break. 
It is a lovely prospect, which every step he takes is 
becoming more definite and more various in the day- 
light. Masses of oleander, of great beauty, with their 
red blossoms, fringed the river, and tracked out its 
course into the distance. The bank of the hill below 
him, and on the right and left, was a maze of fruit- 
trees, about which nature, if it were not the hand of 
man, had had no thought except that they should be all 
together there. The wild olive, the pomegranate, the 
citron, the date, the mulberry, the peach, the apple, 
and the walnut, formed a sort of spontaneous orchard. 
Across the water groves of palm-trees waved their 
long and graceful branches in the morning breeze. 
The stately and solemn ilex, marshalled into long 
avenues, showed the way to substantial granges or 
luxurious villas. The green turf or grass was spread 
out beneath, and here and there flocks and herds were 
emerging out of the twilight and growing distinct 
upon the eye. Elsewhere the ground rose up into 
sudden eminences crowned with chestnut woods, or 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 255 

with plantations of cedar and acacia, or wildernesses 
of the cork-tree, the turpentine, the carooba, the 
white poplar, and the Phoenician juniper, while over- 
head ascended the clinging tendrils of the hop, and 
an underwood of myrtle clothed their stems and roots. 
A profusion of wild flowers carpeted the ground far 
and near. 

Juba stood and gazed till the sun rose opposite to 
him, envying, repining, hating, like Satan looking in 
upon Paradise. The wild mountains, or the locust- 
smitten tract would have better suited the tumult of 
his mind. It would have been a relief to him to have 
retreated from so fair a scene, and to have retraced 
his steps, but he was not his own master, and was 
hurried on. Sorely against his determined strong 
resolve and will, crying out and protesting and shud- 
dering, the youth was forced along into the fulness 
of beauty and blessing with which he was so little in 
tune. With rage and terror he recognized that he had 
no part in his own movements, but was a mere slave. 
In spite of himself he must go forward and behold a 
peace and sweetness which witnessed against him. He 
dashed down through the thick grass, plunged into the 
water, and without rest or respite began a second 
course of aimless toil and travail through the day. 

The savage dogs of the villages howled and fled 
from him as he passed by ; beasts of burden, on their 
way to market, which he overtook or met, stood still, 
foamed and trembled ; the bright birds, the blue jay 
and golden oriole, hid themselves under the leaves and 
grass ; the storks, a religious and domestic bird, 
stopped their sharp clattering note from the high tree 
or farmhouse turret, where they had placed their nests ; 



256 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

the very reptiles skulked away from his shadow, as if 
it were poisonous. The boors, who were at their labour 
in the fields, suspended it to look at one whom the 
Furies were lashing and whirling on. Hour passed 
after hour, the sun attained its zenith, and then de- 
clined, but this dreadful compulsory race continued.* 
Oh what would he have given for one five minutes of 
oblivion, of slumber, of relief from the burning thirst 
which now consumed him ! but the master within him 
ruled his muscles and his joints, and the intense pain 
of weariness had no concomitant of prostration of 
strength. Suddenly he began to laugh hideously ; and 
he went forward dancing and singing loud and play- 
ing antics. He entered a hovel, made faces at the 
children, till one of them fell into convulsions, and 
he ran away with another ; and, when some country 
people pursued him, he flung the child in their faces, 
saying, "Take that," and said he was Pentheus, King 
of Thebes, of whom he had never heard, about to 
solemnize the orgies of Bacchus, and he began to 
spout a chorus of Greek, a language he had never 
learnt or heard spoken. 

Now it is evening again, and he has come up to 
a village grove, where the rustics were holding a feast 
in honour of Pan. The hideous brutal god, with yawn- 
ing mouth, horned head, and goat's feet, was placed 
in a rude shed, and a slaughtered lamb, decked with 
flowers, lay at his feet. The peasants were frisking 
before him, boys and women, when they were startled 
by the sight of a gaunt, wild, mysterious figure, which 
began to dance too. He flung and capered about with 
such vigour that they ceased their sport to look on, half 
with awe and half as a diversion. Suddenly he began 



THE POSSESSION OF JUBA 25T 

to groan and to shriek, as if contending with himself, 
and willing and not willing some new act; and the 
struggle ended in his falling on his hands and knees, 
and crawling like a quadruped towards the idol. When 
he got near, his attitude was still more servile ; still 
groaning and shuddering, he laid himself flat on the 
ground, and wriggled to the idol as a worm, and 
lapped up with his tongue the mingled blood and dust 
which lay about the sacrifice. And then again, as 
if nature had successfully asserted her own dignity, 
he jumped up high in the air, and, falling on the 
god, broke him to pieces, and scampered away out 
of pursuit, before the lookers-on recovered from the 
surprise. 

Another restless, fearful night amid the open coun- 
try ; . . . but it seemed as if the worst had passed, 
and, though still under the heavy chastisement of his 
pride, there was more in Juba of human action and of 
effectual will. The day broke and he found himself on 
the road to Sicca. The beautiful outline of the city 
was right before him. He passed his brother's cottage 
and garden ; it was a wreck. The trees torn up, the 
fences broken down, and the room pillaged of the 
little that could be found there. He went on to the 
city, crying out " Agellius ; " the gate was open, and 
he entered. He went on to the Forum ; he crossed to 
the house of «Tucundus ; few people as yet were stirring 
in the place. He looked up at the wall. Suddenly, by 
the help of projections and other irregularities of the 
brick-work, he mounted up upon the flat roof, and 
dropped down, among the tiles, through the impluviura 
into the middle of the house. He went softly into 
Agellius's closet, where he was asleep, he roused him 



258 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

With the name of Callista, threw his tunic upon him, 
which was by his side, put his boots into his hands, 
and silently beckoned him to follow him. When he 
hesitated, he still whispered to him ''Callista," and at 
length seized him and led him on. He imbarred the 
street door, and with a movement of his arm, more 
like a blow than a farewell, thrust him into the street. 
Then he barred again the door upon him, and lay 
down hiniseK upon the bed which Agellius had left. 
His good angel, we may suppose, had gained a point 
in his favour, for he lay quiet and fell into a heavy 
sleep. 

THE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS 

The plague of locusts, one of the most awful visita- 
tions to which the countries included in the Roman 
Empire were exposed, extended from the Atlantic to 
Ethiopia, from Arabia to India, and from the Nile and 
Red Sea to Greece and the north of Asia Minor. 
Instances are recorded in history of clouds of the 
devastating insect crossing the Black Sea to Poland, 
and the Mediterranean to Lombardy. It is as numer- 
ous in its species as it is wide in its range of territory. 
Brood follows brood, with a sort of family likeness, 
yet with distinct attributes as we read in the prophets 
of the Old Testament, from whom Bochart tells us it 
is possible to enumerate as many as ten kinds. It 
wakens into existence and activity as early as the 
month of March ; but instances are not wanting, as 
in our present history, of its appearance as late as 
June. Even one flight comprises myriads upon 
myriads, passing imagination, to which the drops of 
rain or the sands of the sea are the only fit compar- 



THE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS 259 

ison ; and hence it is almost a proverbial mode of. 
expression in the East (as may be illustrated by the 
sacred pages to which we just now referred), by way 
of describing a vast invading army, to liken it to the 
locusts. So dense are they, when upon the wing, that 
it is no exaggeration to say that they hide the suii, 
from which circumstance indeed their name in Arabic 
is derived. And so ubiquitous are they when they have 
alighted on the earth that they simply cover or clothe 
its surface. 

This last characteristic is stated in the sacred 
account of the plagues of Egypt, where their faculty 
of devastation is also mentioned. The corrupting fly 
and the bruising and prostrating hail preceded them 
in the series of visitations, but they came to do the 
work of ruin more thoroughly. For not only the crops 
and fruits, but the foliage of the forest itself, nay the 
small twigs and the bark of the trees are the victims 
of their curious and energetic rapacity. They have 
been known even to gnaw the door-posts of the houses. 
Nor do they execute their task in so slovenly a way 
that, as they have succeeded other plagues, so they 
may have successors themselves. They take pains to 
spoil what they leave. Like the Harpies, they smear 
everything that they touch with a miserable slime, which 
has the effect of a virus in corroding, or, as some say, 
in scorching and burning. And then, perhaps, as if all 
this were little, when they can do nothing else, they 
die ; as if out of sheer malevolence to man, for the 
poisonous elements of their nature are then let loose 
and dispersed abroad, and create a pestilence ; and they 
manage to destroy many more by their death than in 
their life. 



260 PBOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

Such are the locusts, — whose existence the ancient 
heretics brought forward as their palmary proof that 
there was an evil creator, and of whom an Arabian 
writer shows his national horror, when he says that 
they have the head of a horse, the eyes of an elephant, 
the neck of a bull, the horns of a stag, the breast of 
a lion, the belly of a scorpion, the wings of an eagle, 
the legs of a camel, the feet of an ostrich, and- the tail 
of a serpent. 

And now they are rushing upon a considerable tract 
of that beautiful region of which we have spoken with 
such admiration. The swarm to which Juba pointed 
grew and grew till it became a compact body, as much 
as a furlong square ; yet it was but the vanguard of 
a series of similar hosts, formed one after another out 
of the hot mould or sand, rising into the air like 
clouds, enlarging into a dusky canopy, and then dis- 
charged against the fruitful plain. At length the huge 
innumerous mass was put into motion, and began its 
career, darkening the face of day. As became an in- 
strument of divine power, it seemed to have no volition 
of its own ; it was set off, it drifted with the wind, 
and thus made northwards, straight for Sicca. Thus 
they advanced, host after host, for a time wafted on 
the air, and gradually declining to the earth, while 
fresh broods were carried over the first, and neared 
the earth, after a longer flight, in their turn* For 
twelve miles did they extend from front to rear, and 
their whizzing and hissing could be heard for six miles 
on every side of them. The bright sun, though hidden 
by them, illumined their bodies, and was reflected from 
their quivering wings ; and as they heavily fell earth- 
ward they seemed like the innumerable flakes of a 



THE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS 261 

yellow-coloured snow. And like snow did they descend, 
a living carpet, or rather pall, upon fields, crops, gar- 
dens, copses, groves, orchards, vineyards, olive-woods, 
orangeries, palm plantations, and the deep forests, 
sparing nothing within their reach, and, where there 
was nothing to devour, lying helpless in drifts, or 
crawling forward obstinately, as they best might, with 
the hope of prey. They could spare their hundred 
thousand soldiers twice or thrice over, and not miss 
them ; their masses filled the bottoms of the ravines 
and hollow ways, impeding the traveller as he rode 
forward on his journey, and trampled by thousands 
under his horse-hoofs. In vain was all this overthrow 
and waste by the roadside ; in vain their loss in river, 
pool, and watercourse. The poor peasants hastily dug 
pits and trenches as their enemy came on ; in vain they 
filled them from the wells or with lighted stubble. 
Heavily and thickly did the locusts fall ; they were 
lavish of their lives ; they choked the flame and the 
water, which destroyed them the while, and the vast 
living hostile armament still moved on. 

They moved right on like soldiers in their ranks, 
stopping at nothing, and straggling for nothing ; they 
carried a broad furrow or wheal all across the country, 
black and loathsome, while it was as green and smil- 
ing on each side of them and in front as it had been 
before they came. Before them, in the language of 
prophets, was a paradise, and behind them a desert. 
They are daunted by nothing ; they surmount walls 
and hedges, and enter enclosed gardens or inhabited 
houses. A rare and experimental vineyard has been 
planted in a sheltered grove. The high winds of Africa 
will not commonly allow the light trellice or the slim 



262 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

pole ; but here the lofty poplar of Campania has been 
possible, on which the vine plant mounts so many 
yards into the air that the poor grape-gatherers bar- 
gain for a funeral pile and a tomb as one of the con- 
ditions of their engagement. The locusts have done 
what the winds and lightning could not do, and the 
whole promise of the vintage, leaves and all, is gone, 
and the slender stems are left bare. There is another 
yard, less uncommon, but still tended with more than 
common care ; each plant is kept within due bounds 
by a circular trench round it, and by upright canes on 
which it is to trail ; in an hour the solicitude and long 
toil of the vine-dresser are lost, and his pride hum- 
bled. There is a smiling farm ; another sort of vine, 
of remarkable character, is found against the farm- 
house. This vine springs from one root, and has 
clothed and matted with its many branches the four 
walls. The whole of it is covered thick with long clus- 
ters, which another month will ripen. On every grape 
and leaf there is a locust. Into the dry caves and pits, 
carefully strewed with straw, the harvest-men have 
(safely, as they thought just now) been lodging the 
far-famed African wheat. One grain or root shoots up 
into ten, twenty, fifty, eighty, nay, three or four hun- 
dred stalks ; sometimes the stalks have two ears apiece, 
and these shoot off into a number of lesser ones. These 
stores are intended for the Roman populace, but the 
locusts have been beforehand with them. The small 
patches of ground belonging to the poor peasants up 
and down the country, for raising the turnips, garlick, 
barley, watermelons, on which they live, are the prey 
of these glutton invaders as much as the choicest vines 
and olives. Nor have they any reverence for the villa 



TEE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS 263 

of the Civic decurion or the Roman official. The neatly 
arranged kitchen garden, with its cherries, plums, 
peaches, and apricots, is a waste ; as the slaves sit 
round, in the kitchen in the first court, at their coarse 
evening meal, the room is filled with the invading 
force, and news comes to them that the enemy has 
fallen upon the apples and pears in the basement, and 
is at the same time plundering and sacking the pre- 
serves of quince and pomegranate, and revelling in 
the jars of precious oil of Cyprus and Mendes in the 
storerooms. 

They come up to the walls of Sicca, and are flung 
against them into the ditch. Not a moment's hesita- 
tion or delay ; they recover their footing, they climb 
up the wood or stucco, they surmount the parapet, or 
they have entered in at the windows, fiUing the apart- 
ments, and the most private and luxurious chambers, 
not one or two, like stragglers at forage or rioters after 
a victory, but in order of battle, and with the array 
of an army. Choice plants or flowers about the im- 
pluvia and xysti^ for ornament or refreshment, myr- 
tles, oranges, pomegranates, the rose and the carnation, 
have disappeared. They dim the bright marbles of the 
walls and the gilding of the ceilings. They enter the 
triclinium in the midst of the banquet ; they crawl 
over the viands and spoil what they do not devour. 
Unrelaxed by success and by enjoyment, onward they 
go ; a secret mysterious instinct keeps them together, 
as if they had a king over them. They move along the 
floor in so strange an order that they seem to be a tes- 
sellated pavement themselves, and to be the artificial 
embellishment of the place ; so true are their lines, 
and so perfect is the pattern they describe. Onward 



264 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

they go, to the market, to the temple sacrifices, to the 
baker's stores, to the cookshops, to the confectioners, to 
the druggists ; nothing comes amiss to them ; wherever 
man has aught to eat or drink, there are they, reckless 
of death, strong of appetite, certain of conquest. 

They have passed on ; the men of Sicca sadly con- 
gratulate themselves, and begin to look about them, 
and to sum up their losses. Being the proprietors of 
the neighbouring districts, and the purchasers of its 
produce, they lament over the devastation, not because 
the fair country is disfigured, but because income is 
becoming scanty, and prices are becoming high. How 
is a population of many thousands to be fed ? where is 
the grain, where the melons, the figs, the dates, the 
gourds, the beans, the grapes, to sustain and solace the 
multitudes in their lanes, caverns, and garrets ? This 
is another weighty consideration for the class well-to- 
do in the world. The taxes, too, and contributions, 
the capitation tax, the percentage upon corn, the vari- 
ous articles of revenues due to Rome, how are they 
to be paid? How are cattle to be provided for the 
sacrifices and the tables of the wealthy ? One half, at 
least, of the supply of Sicca is cut off. No longer 
slaves are seen coming into the city from the country 
in troops with their baskets on their shoulders, or beat- 
ing forward the horse, or mule, or ox, overladen with 
its burden, or driving in the dangerous cow or the un- 
resisting sheep. The animation of the place is gone ; 
a gloom hangs over the Forum ; and if its frequenters 
are still merry, there is something of suUenness and 
recklessness in their mirth. The gods have given the 
city up ; something or other has angered them. Locusts, 
indeed, are no uncommon visitation, but at an earlier 



THE PLAGUE OF LOCUSTS 265 

season. Perhaps some temple has been polluted, or 
some unholy rite practised, or some secret conspiracy 
has spread. 

Another and a still worse calamity. The invaders, 
as we have already hinted, could be more terrible still 
in their overthrow than in their ravages. The inhabit- 
ants of the country had attempted, where they could, 
to destroy them by fire and water. It would seem as 
if the malignant animals had resolved that the suf- 
ferers should have the benefit of this policy to the 
full ; for they had not got more than twenty miles 
beyond Sicca when they suddenly sickened and died. 
When they thus had done all the mischief they could 
by their living, when they thus had made their foul 
maws the grave of every living thing, next they died 
themselves, and made the desolated land their own 
grave. They took from it its hundred forms and va- 
rieties of beautiful life, and left it their own fetid and 
poisonous carcases in payment. It was a sudden cata- 
strophe ; they seemed making for the Mediterranean, 
as if, like other great conquerors, they had other 
worlds to subdue beyond it ; but, whether they were 
overgorged or struck by some atmospheric change, or 
that their time was come and they paid the debt of 
nature, so it was that suddenly they fell, and their 
glory came to nought, and aU was vanity to them as 
to others, and " their stench rose up, and their corrup- 
tion rose up, because they had done proudly." 

The hideous swarms lay dead in the m.oist steaming 
underwoods, in the green swamps, in the sheltered 
valleys, in the ditches and furrows of the fields, amid 
the monuments of their own prowess, the ruined crops 
and the dishonoured vineyards. A poisonous element, 



266 PBOSE AND POETEY OF NEWMAN 

issuing from their remains, mingled with the atmo- 
sphere, and corrupted it. The dismayed peasant found 
that a plague had begun ; a new visitation, not con- 
fined to the territory which the enemy had made its 
own, but extending far and wide, as the atmosphere 
extends, in all directions. Their daily toil, no longer 
claimed by the fruits of the earth, which have ceased 
to exist, is now devoted to the object of ridding them- 
selves of the deadly legacy which they have received 
in their stead. In vain ; it is their last toil ; they are 
digging pits, they are raising piles, for their own 
corpses as well as for the bodies of their enemies. In- 
vader and victim lie in the same grave, burn in the 
same heap ; they sicken while they work, and the 
pestilence spreads. A new invasion is menacing Sicca 
in the shape of companies of peasants and slaves, with 
their employers and overseers, nay, the farmers them- 
selves and proprietors, the panic having broken the 
bonds of discipline, rushing thither from famine and 
infection as to a place of safety. The inhabitants of 
the city are as frightened as they, and more energetic. 
They determine to keep them at a distance ; the gates 
are closed ; a strict cordon is drawn ; however, by 
the continued pressure, numbers contrive to make an 
entrance, as water into a vessel, or light through 
the closed shutters, and anyhow the air cannot be 
put in quarantine ; so the pestilence has the better of 
it, and at last appears in the alleys and in the cellars 
of Sicca. 



LOSS AND GAIN • 267 

LOSS AND GAIN 

PART I, CHAPTER XII 

Charles was an affectionate son, and the Long Vaca- 
tion passed very happily at home. He was up early, 
and read steadily till luncheon, and then he was at 
the service of his father, mother, and sisters for the 
rest of the day. He loved the calm, quiet country ; he 
loved the monotonous flow of time, when each day is 
like the other; and, after the excitement of Oxford, 
the secluded parsonage was like a haven beyond the 
waves. The whirl of opinions and perplexities which 
had encircled him at Oxford, now were like the distant 
sound of the ocean — they reminded him of his pre- 
sent security. The undulating meadows, the green 
lanes, the open heath, the common with its wide- 
spreading dusky elms, the high timber which fringed 
the level path from village to village, ever and anon 
broken and thrown into groups, or losing itself in 
copses — even the gate, and the stile, and the turn- 
pike road had the charm, not of novelty, but of long 
familiar use ; they had the poetry of many recollections. 
Nor was the dilapidated deformed church, with its 
outside staircases, its unsightly galleries, its wide- 
intruded windows, its uncouth pews, its low nunting 
table, its forlorn vestry, and its damp earthy smell, 
without its pleasant associations to the inner man ; for 
there it was that, for many a year, Sunday after 
Sunday, he had heard his dear father read and preach ; 
there were the old monuments, with Latin inscriptions 
and strange devices, the black boards with white let- 
ters, the Resurgams and grinning skulls, the fire- 



268 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

buckets, the faded militia-colours, and, almost as much 
a fixture, the old clerk, with a Welsh wig over his ears, 
shouting the responses out of place — which had 
arrested his imagination, and awed him when a child. 
And then, there was his home itself ; its well-known 
rooms, its pleasant routine, its order, and its comfort 
— an old and true friend, the dearer to him because 
he had made new ones. 

" Where I shall be in time to come, I know not," 
he said to himself ; " I am but a boy ; many things 
which I have not a dream of, which my imagination 
cannot compass, may come on me before I die — if I 
live ; but here at least, and now, I am happy, and I 
will enjoy my happiness. Some say that school is the 
pleasantest time of one's life ; this does not exclude 
college. I suppose care is what makes life so wearing. 
At present I have no care, no responsibility ; I sup- 
pose I shall feel a little when I go up for my degree. 
Care is a terrible thing ; I have had a little of it at 
times at school. What a strange thing to fancy, I 
shall be one day twenty-five or thirty ! How the weeks 
are flying by — the Vacation will soon be over ! Oh, 
I am so happy, it quite makes me afraid. Yet I shall 
have strength for my day." 

Sometimes, however, his thoughts took a sadder 
turn, and he anticipated the future more vividly than 
he enjoyed the present. Mr. Malcolm had come to see 
them, after an absence from the parsonage for some 
years; his visit was a great pleasure to Mr. Reding, 
and not much less to himself, to whom a green home 
and a family circle were agreeable sights, after his 
bachelor-life at college. He had been a great favourite 
with Charles and his sisters as children, though now 



LOSS AND GAIN 269 

his popularity with them for the most part rested on 
the memory of the past. When he told them amusing 
stories, or allowed them to climb his knee and take off 
his spectacles, he did all that was necessary to gain 
their childish hearts ; more is necessary to conciliate 
the affection of young men and women ; and thus it is 
not surprising that he lived in their minds principally 
by prescription. He neither knew this, nor would have 
thought much about it, if he had ; for, like many per- 
sons of advancing years, he made himself very much 
his own centre, did not care to enter into the minds of 
others, did not consult for them, or find his happiness 
in them. He was kind and friendly to the young 
people, as he would be kind to a canary-bird or a lap- 
dog ; it was a sort of external love ; and though they 
got on capitally with him, they did not miss him when 
gone, nor would have been much troubled to know that 
he was never to come again. Charles drove him about 
the country, stamped his letters, secured him his news- 
papers from the neighbouring town, and listened to his 
stories about Oxford and Oxford men. He really liked 
him, and wished to please him : but, as to consulting 
him in any serious matter, or going to him for comfort 
in affliction, he would as soon have thought of betaking 
him to Dan the pedlar, or old Isaac who played the 
Sunday bassoon. 

" How have your peaches been this year, Malcolm ? " 
said Mr. Reding one day after dinner to his guest. 

" You ought to know that we have no peaches in 
Oxford," answered Mr. Malcolm. 

" My memory plays me false, then ; I had a vision 
of, at least, October peaches on one occasion, and fine 
ones, too." 



270 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

" Ah, you mean at old Tom Spindle's, the jockey's," 
answered Mr. Malcolm ; " it 's true, he had a bit of 
brick wall, and was proud of it. But peaches come when 
there is no one in Oxford to eat them ; so either the 
tree, or at least the fruit, is a great rarity there. Oxford 
was n't so empty once ; you have old mulberry-trees 
there in record of better days." 

" At that time, too," said Charles, " I suppose, the 
more expensive fruits were not cultivated. Mulberries 
are the witness, not only of a full college, but of simple 
tastes." 

" Charles is secretly cutting at our hothouse here," 
said Mr. Reding ; " as if our first father did not prefer 
fruits and flowers to beef and mutton." 

" No, indeed," said Charles, " I think peaches capital 
things ; and as to flowers, I am even too fond of 
scents." 

" Charles has some theory, then, about scents, I '11 
be bound," said his father ; ^' I never knew a boy who 
so placed his likings and dislikings on fancies. He 
began to eat olives directly he read the (Edipus of 
Sophocles ; and I verily believe, will soon give up 
oranges from his dislike to King William." 

''Every one does so," said Charles: "who would 
not be in the fashion ? There 's Aunt Kitty, she calls 
a bonnet ' a sweet ' one year, which makes her ' a per- 
fect fright ' the next." 

" You 're right. Papa, in this instance," said his 
mother ; " I know he has some good reason, though I 
never can recollect it, why he smells a rose or distils 
lavender. What is it, my dear Mary ? " 

'" Relics ye are of Eden's bowers,' " said she. 

'' Why, sir, that was precisely your own reason just 
now," said Charles to his father. 



LOSS AND GAIN 271 

"There's more than that," said Mr. Eeding, ''if 
I knew what it was." 

" He thinks the scent more intellectual than the 
other senses," said Mary, smiling. 

" Such a boy for paradoxes ! " said his mother. 

" Well, so it is in a certain way," said Charles ; 
"but I can't explain. Sounds and scents are more 
ethereal, less material ; they have no shape — like the 
angels." 

Mr. Malcolm laughed. 

" Well, I grant it, Charles," he said ; " they are 
length without breadth ! " 

" Did you ever hear the like ! " said Mrs. Reding, 
laughing too ; " don't encourage him, Mr. Malcolm ; 
you are worse than he. Angels length without 
breadth!" 

" They pass from place to place, they come, they 
go," continued Mr. Malcolm. 

" They conjure up the past so vividly," said Charles. 

" But sounds surely more than scents," said Mr. 
Malcolm. 

" Pardon me ; the reverse, as / think," answered 
Charles. 

" That is a paradox, Charles," said Mr. Malcolm ; 
"the smell of roast-beef never went further than to 
remind a man of dinner ; but sounds are pathetic and 
inspiring." 

" Well, sir, but think of this," said Charles ; " scents 
are complete in themselves, yet do not consist of parts. 
Think how very distinct the smell of a rose is from 
a pink, a pink from a sweet-pea, a sweet-pea from 
a stock, a stock from lilac, lilac from lavender, laven- 
der from jasmine, jasmine from honeysuckle, honey- 



272 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

suckle from hawthorn, hawthorn from hyacinth, hya- 
cinth—" 

"Spare us," interrupted Mr. Malcolm; "you are 
going through the index of Loudon ? " 

" And these are only the scents of flowers ; how dif- 
ferent flowers smell from fruits, fruits from spices, 
spices from roast-beef or pork-cutlets, and so on. Now, 
what I was coming to is this — these scents are per- 
fectly distinct from each other, and sui generis ; they 
never can be confused ; yet each is communicated to 
the apprehension in an instant. Sights take up a great 
space, a tune is a succession of sound ; but scents are 
at once specific and complete, yet indivisible. Who can 
halve a scent ? they need neither time nor space ; thus 
they are immaterial or spiritual." 

" Charles has n't been to Oxford for nothing," said 
his mother, laughing, and looking at Mary ; " this is 
what I call chopping logic ! " 

"Well done, Charles ! " cried Mr. Malcolm ; "and 
now, since you have such clear notions of the power of 
smells, you ought, like the man in the story, to be sat- 
isfied with smelling at your dinner, and grow fat upon 
it. It 's a shame you sit down to table." 

" Well, sir," answered Charles, " some people do 
seem to thrive on snuff at least." 

" For shame, Charles ! " said Mr. Malcolm ; " you 
have seen me use the common-room snuff-box to keep 
myself awake after dinner ; but nothing more. I keep 
a box in my pocket merely as a bauble; it was a 
present You should have lived when I was young. 
There was old Dr. Troughton of Nun's Hall, he car- 
ried his snuff loose in his pocket ; and old Mrs. Vice- 
Principal Daffy used to lay a train along her arm, and 



LOSS AND GAIN 273 

fire It with her nose. Doctors of medicine took it as 
a preservative against infection, and doctors of divinity 
against drowsiness in church." 

" They take wine against infection now," said Mr. 
Reding ; " it 's a much surer protective." 

" Wine ? " cried Mr. Malcohn ; " oh, they did n't 
take less wine then, as you and I know. On certain 
solemn occasions they made a point of getting drunk, 
the whole college, from the Vice-Principal or Sub-War- 
den down to the scouts. Heads of houses were kept in 
order by their wives ; but I assure you the jolly god 
came very near Mr. Vice-Chancellor himself. There 
was old Dr. Sturdy of St. Michael's, a great martinet 
in his time. One day the King passed through Oxford ; 
Sturdy, a tall, upright, iron-faced man, had to meet 
him in procession at Magdalen Bridge, and walked 
down with his pokers before him, gold and silver, 
vergers, cocked hats, and the rest. There was n't one 
of them that was n't in liquor. Think of the good old 
man's horror, Majesty in the distance, and his own 
people swaying to and fro under his very nose, and 
promising to leave him for the gutter before the march 
was ended." 

" No one can get tipsy with snuff, I grant," said 
Mr. Reding ; " but if wine has done some men harm, 
it has done others a deal of good." 

" Hair powder is as bad as snuff," said Mary, pre- 
ferring the former subject ; " there 's old Mr. Butler 
of Cooling ; his wig is so large and full of powder that 
when he nods his head I am sure to sneeze." 

"Ah, but all these are accidents, young lady," said 
Mr. Malcolm, put out by this block to the conver- 
sation, and running off somewhat testily in another 



274 PEOSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

direction ; " accidents after all. Old people are always 
the same ; so are young. Each age has its own fash- 
ion ; if Mr. Butler wore no wig, still there would be 
something about him odd and strange to young eyes. 
Charles, don't you be an old bachelor. No one cares 
for old people. Marry, my dear boy ; look out betimes 
for a virtuous young woman, who will make you an 
attentive wife." 

Charles slightly coloured, and his sister laughed as 
if there was some understanding between them. Mr. 
Malcolm continued : " Don't wait till you want some 
one to buy flannel for your rheumatism or gout ; marry 
betimes." 

" You will let me take my degree first, sir ? " said 
Charles. 

" Certainly, take your M.A.'s, if you will ; but don't 
become an old Fellow. Don't wait till forty. People 
make the strangest mistakes." 

"Dear Charles will make a kind and affectionate 
husband, I am sure," said his mother, " when the time 
comes ; and come it will, though not just yet. Yes, 
my dear boy," she added, nodding at him, " you 
will not be able to escape your destiny, when it 
comes." 

" Charles, you must know," said Mr. Eeding to his 
guest, " is romantic in his notions just now. I believe 
it is, that he thinks no one good enough for him. Oh, 
my dear Charlie, don't let me pain you, I meant no- 
thing serious ; but somehow he has not hit it off very 
well with some young ladies here, who expected more 
attention than he cared to give." 

" I am sure," said Mary, " Charles is most atten- 
tive whenever there is occasion, and always has his 



LOSS AND GAIN 275 

eyes about him to do a service ; only he 's a bad hand 
at small talk." 

" All will come in time, my dear," said his mother ; 
" a good son makes a good husband." 

'' And a very loving papa," said Mr. Malcolm. 

" Oh, spare me, sir," said poor Charles ; '' how have 
I deserved thLs ? " 

"Well," proceeded Mr. Malcolm, " and young ladies 
ought to marry betimes too." 

" Come, Mary, your turn is coming," cried Charles ; 
and taking his sister's hand, he threw up the sash, and 
escaped with her into the garden. 

They crossed the lawn, and took refuge in a shrub- 
bery. 

" How strange it is ! " said Mary, as they strolled 
along the winding walk ; "we used to like Mr. Mal- 
colm so, as children ; but now, I like him stilly but he 
is not the same." 

" We are older," said her brother ; " different things 
take us now." 

" He used to be so kind," continued she ; " when 
he was coming, the day was looked out for ; and 
Mamma said, ' Take care you be good when Mr. Mal- 
colm comes.' And he was sure to bring a twelfth- 
cake, or a Noah's ark, or something of the sort. And 
then he romped with us, and let us make fun of 
him." 

" Indeed it is n't he that is changed," said Charles, 
" but we ; we are in the time of life to change ; we 
have changed already, and shall change still." 

" What a mercy it is," said his sister, " that we are 
so happy among ourselves as a family ! If we change, 
we shall change together, as apples of one stock; if 



276 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

one fails, the other does. Thus we are always the 
same to each other." 

" It is a mercy, indeed," said Charles ; " we are so 
blessed that I am sometimes quite frightened." His 
sister looked earnestly at him. He laughed a little, 
to turn off the edge of his seriousness. " You would 
know what I mean, dear Mary, if you had read Herod- 
otus. A Greek tyrant feared his own excessive pro- 
sperity, and therefore made a sacrifice to fortune. I 
mean, he gave up something which he held most pre- 
cious ; he took a ring from his finger, and cast it into 
the sea, lest the Deity should afflict him, if he did not 
afflict himself." 

" My dear Charles, if we do but enjoy God's gifts 
thankfully, and take care not to set our hearts on 
them, or to abuse them, we need not fear for their 
continuance." 

" Well," said Charles, " there 's one text which has 
ever dwelt on my mind, ' Rejoice with trembling.' I 
can't take full, unrestrained pleasure in anything." 

" Why not, if you look at it as God's gift ? " asked 
Mary. 

" I don't defend it," he replied ; " it 's my way ; it 
may be a selfish prudence, for what I know ; but 1 
am sure that, did I give my heart to any creature, 
I should be withdrawing it from God. How easily 
could I idolize these sweet walks, which we have 
known for so many years ! " 

They walked on in silence. " Well," said Mary, 
'' whatever we lose, no change can affect us as a fam- 
ily. While we are we, we are to each other what 
nothing external can be to us, whether as given or as 
taken away." Charles made no answer. '' What has 



LOSS AND GAIN 277 

come to you, dear Charles?" she said, stopping and 
looking at him ; then, gently removing his hair and 
smoothing his forehead, she said, '' You are so sad 
to-day." 

"Dearest Mary," he made answer, ''nothing's the 
matter, indeed. I think it is Mr. Malcolm who has 
put me out. It 's so stupid to talk of the prospects of 
a boy like me. Don't look so, I mean nothing; only 
it annoys me." Mary smiled. " What I mean is," con- 
tinued Charles, " that we can rely on nothing here, 
and are fools if we build on the future." 

" We can rely on each other," she repeated. 

" Ah, dear Mary, don't say so ; it frightens me.'^ 
She looked round at him surprised, and almost fright- 
ened herself. " Dearest," he continued, " I mean no- 
thing; only everything is so uncertain here below." 

" We are sure of each other, Charles." 

" Yes, Mary," and he kissed her affectionately, " it 
is true, most true ; " then he added, " All I meant w^as 
that it seems presumptuous to say so. David and Jon- 
athan were parted ; St. Paul and St. Barnabas." Tears 
stood in Mary's eyes. " Oh, what an ass I am," he 
said, " for thus teasing you about nothing ; no, I only 
mean that there is One oiily who cannot die, who 
never changes, only one. It can't be wrong to remem- 
ber this. Do you recollect Cowper's beautiful lines ? 
I know them without having learned them — they 
struck me so much the first time I read them ; " — and 
he repeated them : — 

'* Thou art the source and centre of all minds, 
Their only point of rest, Eternal Word. 
From Thee departing, they are lost, and rove 
At random, without honour, hope, or peace. 



278 PROSE AND POETRY OF NEWMAN 

From Thee is all that soothes the life of man, 
His high endeavour, and his glad success. 
His strength to suffer, and liis will to serve. 
But oh, Thou Sovereign Giver of all good. 
Thou art of all Thy gifts Thyself the crown; 
Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor, 
And with Thee rich, take what thou wilt away." 



VII 
POEMS 

MY LADY NATURE AND HER DAUGHTERS 

Lames, well I deem, delight 

In comely tire to move ; 
Soft, and delicate, and bright, 

Are the robes they love. 
Silks, where hues alternate play. 
Shawls, and scarfs, and mantles gay, 
Gold, and gems, and crisped hair, 
Fling their light o'er lady fair. 
'Tis not waste, nor sinful pride, — > 

Name them not, nor fault beside, — 
But her very cheerfulness 
Prompts and weaves the curious dress 
While her holy thoughts still roam 
'Mid birth-friends and scenes of home. 
Pleased to please whose praise is dear, 
Glitters she ? she glitters there ; — 
And she has a pattern found her 
In Nature's glowing world around her. 

Nature loves, as lady bright. 

In gayest guise to shine, 
AU forms of grace, all tints of light, 

Fringe her robe divine. 
Sun-lit heaven, and rain-bow cloud. 
Changeful main, and mountain proud. 
Branching tree, and meadow green. 
All are deck'd in broider'd sheen. 
Not a bird on bough-propp'd tower, 



280 MY LADY NATURE AND HER DAUGHTERS 

Insect slim, nor tiny flower, 
Stone, nor spar, nor shell of sea, 
But is fair in its degree. 
^ 'T is not pride, this vaunt of beauty ; 

Well she 'quits her trust of duty ; 
And, amid her gorgeous state, 
Bright, and bland, and delicate, 
Ever beaming from her face 
Praise of a Father's love we trace. 

Ladies, shrinking from the view 

Of the prying day. 
In tranquil diligence pursue 

Their heaven-appointed way. 
Noiseless duties, silent cares. 
Mercies lighting unawares. 
Modest influence working good, 
Gifts, by the keen heart understood, 
Such as viewless spirits might give, 
These they love, in these they live. — 
Mighty Nature speeds her through 
Her daily toils in silence too : 
Calmly rolls her giant spheres, 
Sheds by stealth her dew's kind tears ; 
Cheating sage's vex'd pursuit, 
Churns the sap, matures the fruit, 
And, her deft hand still congealing. 
Kindles motion, life, and feeling. 

Ladies love to laugh and sing, 

To rouse the chord's full sound, 

Or to join the festive ring 

Where dancers gather round. 



MY LADY NATURE AND HER DAUGHTERS 281 

Not a sight so fair on earth, 

As a lady's graceful mirth ; 

Not a sound so chasing pain, 

As a lady's thrilling strain. — 

Nor is Nature left behind 

In her lighter moods of mind ; 

Calm her duties to fulfil. 

In her glee a prattler still. 

Bird and beast of every sort 

Hath its antic and its sport ; 

Chattering brook, and dancing gnat, 

Subtle cry of evening bat, 

Moss uncouth, and twigs grotesque, 

These are Nature's picturesque. 

Where the birth of Poesy ? 

Its fancy and its fire ? 
Nature's earth, and sea, and sky. 

Fervid thoughts inspire. 
Where do wealth and power find rest. 
When hopes have fail'd, or toil oppress'd? 
Parks, and lawns, and deer, and trees. 
Nature's work, restore them ease. — 
Rare the rich, the gifted rare, — 
Where shall work-day souls repair, 
Unennobled, unrefined. 
From the rude world and unkind ? 
Who shall friend their lowly lot ? 
High-born Nature answers not. 
Leave her in her starry dome, 
Seek we lady-lighted home. 
Nature 'mid the spheres bears sway, 
Ladies rule where hearts obey. 

Oxford, February 4, 1829. 



282 SENSITIVENESS — HUMILIATION 

SENSITIVENESS 

Time was, I shrank from what was right 
From fear of what was wrong ; 

I would not brave the sacred fight, 
Because the foe was strong. 

But now I cast that finer sense 

And sorer shame aside ; 
Such dread of sin was indolence, 

Such aim at Heaven was pride. 

So, when my Saviour calls, I rise, 

And calmly do my best ; 
Leaving to Him, with silent eyes 

Of hope and fear, the rest. 

I step, I mount where He has led. 
Men count my baitings o'er ; — 

I know them ; yet though self I dread, 
I love His precept more. 

Lazaret^ Malta, January 13, 1833. 



HUMILIATION 

I HAVE been honour'd and obey'd, 
I have met scorn and slight ; 

And my heart loves earth's sober shade. 
More than her laughing light. 

For what is rule but a sad weight 
Of duty and a snare ? 



THE QUEEN OF SEASONS 283 

What meanness, but witli happier fate 
The Saviour's Cross to share ? 

This my hid choice, if not from heaven, 

Moves on the heavenward Hne ; 
Cleanse it, good Lord, from earthly leaven, 

And make it simply Thine. 

Lazaret J Malta^ January 16, 1833. 



THE QUEEN OF SEASONS 

{A Song for an inclement May) 

All is divine 

which the Highest has made, 
Through the days that He wrought, 

till the day when He stay'd ; 
Above and below, 

within and around, 
From the centre of space, 

to its uttermost bound. 

In beauty surpassing 

the Universe smiled. 
On the morn of its birth, 

like an innocent child. 
Or like the rich bloom 

of some delicate flower ; 
And the Father rejoiced 

in the work of His power. 

Yet worlds brighter still, 

and a brighter than those, 



284 THE QUEEN OF SEASONS 

And a brighter again, 

He had made, had He chose ; 
And you never could name 

that conceivable best, 
To exhaust the resources 

the Maker possess'd. 

But I know of one work 

of His Infinite Hand, 
Which special and singular 

ever must stand ; 
So perfect, so pure, 

and of gifts such a store, 
That even Omnipotence 

ne'er shall do more. 

The freshness of May, 

and the sweetness of June, 
And the fire of eTuly 

in its passionate noon, 
Munificent August, 

September serene, 
Are together no match 

for my glorious Queen. 

O Mary, all months 

and all days are thine own, 
In thee lasts their joyousness, 

when they are gone ; 
And we give to thee May, 

not because it is best. 
But because it comes first, 

and is pledge of the rest. 
The Oratory, 1850. 



VALENTINE TO A LITTLE GIRL 28& 

VALENTINE TO A LITTLE GIRL 

Little maiden, dost thou pine 
For a faithful Valentine ? 
Art thou scanning timidly 
Every face that meets thine eye ? 
Art thou fancying there may be 
Fairer face than thou dost see ? 
Little maiden, scholar mine, 
Wouldst thou have a Valentine ? 

Go and ask, my little child. 
Ask the Mother undefiled : 
Ask, for she will draw thee near, 
And will whisper in thine ear : — 
" Valentine ! the name is good ; 

For it comes of lineage high, 

And a famous family : 
And it tells of gentle blood. 
Noble blood, — and nobler still, 

For its owner freely pour'd 
Every drop there was to spill 

In the quarrel of his Lord. 
Valentine ! I know the name, 
Many martyrs bear the same ; 
And they stand in glittering ring 
Round their warrior God and King, — 

Who before and for them bled, — 

With their robes of ruby red. 
And their swords of cherub flame." 

Yes ! there is a plenty there. 
Knights without reproach or fear, — 



286 THE GOOD SAMARITAN 

Such St. Denys, such St. George, 

Martin, Maurice, Theodore, 

And a hundred thousand more ; 

Guerdon gain'd and warfare o'er, 
By that sea without a surge, 
And beneath the eternal sky, 

And the beatific Sun, 
In Jerusalem above, 

Valentine is every one ; 
Choose from out that company 

Whom to serve, and whom to love. 

The Oratory, 1850. 

THE GOOD SAMARITAN 

Oh that thy creed were sound ! ^ 
For thou dost soothe the heart, thou Church of Rome, 

By thy unwearied watch and varied round 
Of service, in thy Saviour's holy home, 
I cannot walk the city's sultry streets. 
But the wide porch invites to still retreats. 
Where passion's thirst is calm'd, and care's unthank- 
ful gloom. 

There, on a foreign shore. 
The home-sick solitary finds a friend : 

Thoughts, prison'd long for lack of speech, outpour 
Their tears ; and doubts in resignation end. 
I almost fainted from the long delay 
That tangles me within this languid bay. 
When comes a foe, my wounds with oil and wine to 
tend. 
Palermo, June 13, 1833. 

1 Of course this is the exclamation of one who, when so writ- 
iHg, was not in the Catholic Communion. 



HOEA NOVISSIMA 287 



WAITING FOR THE MORNING 

" Quoddam quasi pratum, in quo animae nihil patiebantur, sed mane- 
bant, nondum idoneae Visioni Beatae." — Bedae Hist. v. 

They are at rest : 
We may not stir the heaven of their repose 
With loud-voiced grief, or passionate request, 

Or selfish plaint for those 
Who in the mountain grots of Eden lie, 
And hear the fourfold river, as it hurries by. 

They hear it sweep 
In distance down the dark and savage vale ; 
But they at eddying pool or current deep 

Shall nevermore grow pale ; 
They hear, and meekly muse, as- fain to know 
How long untired, unspent, that giant stream shall 
flow. 

And soothing sounds 
Blend with the neighbouring waters as they glide ; 
Posted along the haunted garden's bounds 

Angelic forms abide. 
Echoing, as words of watch, o'er lawn and grove, 
The verses of that hymn which Seraphs chant above. 

Oxford, 1835. 



HORA NOVISSIMA 

Whene'er goes forth Thy dread command, 

And my last hour is nigh. 
Lord, grant me in a Christian land. 

As I was born^ to die. 



288 LUCIS CREATOB OPTIME 

I pray not, Lord, that friends may be, 
Or kindred, standing by, — 

Choice blessing ! which I leave to Thee 
To grant me or deny. 

But let my failing limbs beneath 
My Mother's smile recline ; 

And prayers sustain my labouring breath 
From out her sacred shrine. 

And let the cross beside my bed 
In its dread Presence rest : 

And let the absolving words be said, 
To ease a laden breast. 

Thou, Lord, where'er we lie, canst aid ; 

But He who taught His own 
To live as one, will not upbraid 

The dread to die alone. 

At Sea, June 22, 1833. 



LUCIS CREATOR OPTIME 

(vespers SUNDAY) 

Father of Lights, by whom each day 

Is kindled out of night, 
Who, when the heavens were made, didst lay 

Their rudiments in light; 
Thou who didst bind and blend in one 

The glistening morn and evening pale, 
Hear Thou our plaint, wheu light is gone, 

And lawlessness and strife prevail. 



THE PILLAR OF THE CLOUD 289 

Hear, lest the whelming weight of crime 

Wreck us with life in view ; 
Lest thoughts and schemes of sense and time 

Earn us a sinner's due. 
So may we knock at Heaven's door, 

And strive the immortal prize to win, 
Continually and evermore 

Guarded without and pure within. 

Grant this, O Father, Only Son, 

And Spirit, God of grace, 
To whom all worship shall be done 

In every time and place. 



THE PILLAR OF THE CLOUD 

Lead, Kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom 

Lead Thou me on ! 
The night is dark, and I am far from home — 

Lead Thou me on ! 
Keep Thou my feet ; I do not ask to see 
The distant scene — one step enough for me. 

I was not ever thus, nor pray'd that Thou 

Shouldst lead me on. 
I loved to choose and see my path, but now 

Lead Thou me on ! 
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears. 
Pride ruled my will : remember not past years. 

So long Thy power hath blest me, sure it still 
Will lead me on, 



290 THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS 

O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till 

The night is gone ; 
And with the morn those angel faces smile 
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile. 

At Sea, June 16, 1833. 



TWO LYRICS FROM "THE DREAM OF 
GERONTIUS'' 

Soul 
I go before my Judge. Ah ! . . 

Angel 

. . . Praise to His Name 
The eager spirit has darted from my hold, 
And, with the intemperate energy of love, 
Flies to the dear feet of Emmanuel ; 
But, ere it reach them, the keen sanctity. 
Which with its effluence, like a glory, clothes 
And circles round the Crucified, has seized. 
And scorch'd, and shrivell'd it ; and now it lies 
Passive and still before the awful Throne. 
O happy, suffering soul ! for it is safe. 
Consumed, yet quicken'd, by the glance of God. 

Soul 

Take me away, and in the lowest deep 

There let me be. 
And there in hope the lone night-watches keep, 

Told out for me. 
There, motionless and happy in my pain. 

Lone, not forlorn, — 



THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS 291 

There will I sing my sad perpetual strain, 

Until the morn. 
There will I sing, and soothe my stricken breast, 

Which ne'er can cease 
To throb, and pine, and languish, till possest 

Of its Sole Peace. 
There will I sing my absent Lord and Love : — 

Take me away. 
That sooner I may rise, and go above. 
And see Him in the truth of everlasting day. 

Angel 

Now let the golden prison ope its gates. 
Making sweet music, as each fold revolves 
Upon its ready hinge. And ye, great powers, 
Angels of Purgatory, receive from me 
My charge, a precious soul, until the day, 
When, from all bond and forfeiture released, 
I shall reclaim it for the courts of light. 



Angel 

Softly and gently, dearly-ransom'd soul. 
In my most loving arms I now enfold thee. 

And, o'er the penal waters, as they roll, 

I poise thee, and I lower thee, and hold thee. 

And carefully I dip thee in the lake. 

And thou, without a sob or a resistance, 

Dost through the flood thy rapid passage take, 
Sinking deep, deeper, into the dim distance. 



292 HOME 

Angels, to whom the willing task is given, 

Shall tend, and nurse, and lull thee, as thou liest ; 

And masses on the earth, and prayers in heaven. 
Shall aid thee at the Throne of the Most Highest. 

Farewell, but not for ever ! brother dear, 

Be brave and patient on thy bed of sorrow ; 

Swiftly shall pass thy night of trial here. 

And I will come and wake thee on the morrow. 

The Oratory^ January^ 1865. 



HOME 

Where'er I roam in this fair, English land, 

The vision of a temple meets my eyes : 

Modest without : within all glorious rise 

Its love-enclustered columns, and expand 

Their slender arms. Like olive plants they stand 

Each answering each in home's soft sympathies. 

Sisters and brothers. At the altar sighs 

Parental fondness, and with anxious hand 

Tenders its offering of young vows and prayers, 

The same and not the same. Go where I will 

The vision beams ! ten thousand shrines all one. 

Dear, fertile soil ! What foreign culture bears 

Such fruit ? That I through distant climes may run 

My weary round, yet miss thy likeness still ! 

Oxford, November 16, 1832. 



NOTES 



SELECTIONS FROM "APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA'' 

PAGE 

1 Dr. Isaac Watts (1674-1748). In his time one of the most 
popular of the serious prose writers, but best known now 
by his hymns. 

2 emigre. This term was almost Anglicized after the French 
Revolution, so great was the number of refugees from 
France who went into England to earn a living. English 
literature of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth 
centuries has many sympathetic allusions to them. Mrs. 
Mitford's Our Village has a delightful sketch of an exiled 
abb6. Miss Burney, the author of Evelina, married an emi- 
gre, and the Emigres of Thackeray are classical. 

When I was at Littlemore. '' The reality of conversion, as 
cutting at the root of doubt, providing a chain between 
God and the soul, that is, with every link complete; I know 
lam right. How do you know it? I know, I know.'' — MS. 
Book: 1817. Mrs. Mozley, in Letters and Correspondence, 
says that on reading this and similar passages in later life, 
Dr. Newman wrote: ''The unpleasant style in which it is 
written arises from my habit as a boy to compose. I seldom 
wrote without an eye to style, and since my taste was bad 
my style was bad. I wrote in prose as another might write 
in verse, or sing instead of speaking, or dance instead of 
walking. Also my Evangelical tone contributed to its bad 
taste." Letter to his nephew, Mr. J. R. Mozley, March, 
1884: '' For myself now at the end of a long life, I say from 
a full heart that God has never failed me, never disap- 
pointed me, has ever turned evil into good for me. When I 
was young I used to say, (and I trust it was not presump- 
tion to say it,) that Our Lord ever answered my prayers. 
And what He has been to me, who has deserved His love so 
little, such will He be, I believe, to every one who does not 
repel Him, and turn from His pleading." 

3 Mrs. Radcliffe's or Miss Porter's. Mrs. Radcliffe, author of 
The Mysteries of Udolpho, who with Beckford and Maturin 
formed the School of Terror. Miss Jane Porter, whose 
Thaddeus of Warsaw is claimed by some to be the first 
historical novel. 

Paine 's Tracts against the Old Testament. Thomas Paine 
(1737-1809), author of The Age of Reason. 
David Hume (1711-1776). Philosopher and historian. His 
treatise on miracles has been superseded by Newman's. 
He in his philosophic system attempted '' to introduce the 



294 NOTES 

PAGE 

experimental method into moral subjects." He is best 
known by his History of England. 
Voltaire (1694-1778). See note on p. 129. 

4 Rev. Walter Mayers (1790-1828). Minister at Old Brent- 
ford, 1814. He was stationed successively at Brampton, 
and Over-worton. Life and Sermons: London, 1831. 
Romaine, William (1714-1795). His ideas on the spiritual 
life are perhaps best shown in The Life of Faith, 1763; The 
Walk of Faith, 1771; and The Triumph of Faith, 1795. He 
was an extremist on the doctrine of election and justifica- 
tion by faith. He was an ardent follower of White field, 
an enthusiast who hated the formalism of the Anglican 
Church, and was called by John Wesley ''a truly sympa- 
thizing spirit." He was a great favorite with the poor, 
but no favorite with his aristocratic parishioners in Han- 
over Square. He was a clergyman of the Church of England 
to the end of his life, though his apparently immoderate 
enthusiasm disgusted many of his brethren. His scholar- 
ship is attested by his edition of the Hebrew Concordance 
of Marius de Calasio. He looked on Wesley's opinions on 
free will and perfection as savoring of the Roman Catholic 
doctrine that works are necessary to faith. He held Cal- 
vin's views on predestination. He was accused of leading 
to antinomianism. 

5 Thomas Scott (1747-1821), "A few torn Latin books" 
gave him his impetus towards scholarship. The Force of 
Truth, edited for its style by the poet Cowper, is a most 
interesting autobiography of a spiritual progress. It is 
a progenitor of the Apologia, and Newman confesses his 
indebtedness to Scott. It shows Scott's evolution from 
Unitarianism to extreme fervor. He himself was greatly 
influenced by his friend, John Newton. His great work 
is the commentary on the Bible, to which Newman also 
alludes. In contrast to Romaine, Scott was a forceful 
opponent to antinomianism. 

Daniel Wilson (1778-1858). He was bigoted, ardent, and 
enthusiastic. Long after he had preached the sermons that 
Newman admired, he wrote bitterly against the Oxford 
Movement. Some reader of The Vicar of Wakefield called 
him *' a Doctor Primrose in a Mitre." His son, not he^ wrote 
Our Protestant Faith in Danger, in 1850. This was quite in 
line with the Bishop's hatred of the Catholic revival. 
Jones of Nayland, WilHam Jones (1726-1780), was a na- 
tive of Northamptonshire, but as he was appointed to the 
curacy of Nayland in 1777, he is known as Jones of Nay- 
land. Among his important works — he was one of the 
most important Anglican theologians of his time — were 
the Catholic Doctrine of the Trinity Proved from Scripture, 
and A Letter to the Common People in Answer to Some Popu- 
lar Arguments against the Trinity. 



NOTES 295 

PAGE 

Athanasian Creed. By this name is commonly called the 
confession of faith in the breviary, which is said on Sunday 
at prime. Its proper designation would seem to be ^' Fides 
CathoHca," but in the Council of Autun it was called the 
faith of the holy prelate Athanasius. 

Antinomianism. The belief that faith alone is necessary to 
salvation. Agricola, one of Luther's disciples, carried it to 
a great extreme. Melanchthon was especially opposed to it. 
The tendency of the antinomians has always been to ig- 
nore the ten commandments, and to look on Moses, the 
law-giver, as some of the Greeks looked on Socrates before 
they poisoned him with hemlock. St. James's '' Faith with- 
out works is dead" is to them a maxim of horror. 

6 William Law (1686-1761). Anglican divine, devoted to the 
Stuarts. He was a great admirer of Thomas a Kempis's 
Imitation of Christ and of many other Catholic mystical 
works. His attack on the theatres of his time was furi- 
ous and bitter. His Serious Call to a Devout and Holy 
Life, adapted to the State and Condition of All Orders of 
Christians, 1728, influenced Dr. Johnson's religious opin- 
ions; it is very well written, and presents ideas of daily 
living very simply and deeply. The characters, Miranda 
and Flora, were drawn from Gibbon's aunts. ''Many 
of his portraits," Gibbon says, ''are not unworthy of 
La Bruyere." 

7 Joseph Milner (1744-1797) was an Anglican divine with a 
tendency toward ardor and zeal which was looked on as 
Methodistical. His History of the Church of Christ was an 
attempt to show that the history of the Church was not 
merely a narrative of theological dispute, as writers, follow- 
ing Gibbon, had made it. This work was continued by 
his brother Isaac and the Reverend John Scott. Samuel 
Maitland, the author of the famous Dark Ages, pointed out 
some errors in the Waldensian part of it. 

St. Axigustine. See note on p. 201. 

St. Ambrose (340-397) . Bishop of Milan ; friend of St. Augus- 
tine. He braved the Emperor Theodosius ioT the sake of 
humanity. 

Thomas Newton (1704-1782). Bishop of Bristol. Editor of 
Milton's Paradise Lost. In 1754 he published Dissertations 
on the Prophecies, which have been remarkably fulfilled, and 
are at this time fulfilling in the world. 

8 Richard Whately (1787-1863). Protestant Archbishop of 
Dublin. Dr. Whately 's Logic is well known for its style 
and careful structure; but historically it is weak, and its 
treatment of the schoolmen and the scientific method is 
very intolerant. His theological opinions tended towards 
agnosticism, — before that word was invented. He denied 
the logical necessity of the death of our Lord and the 
resurrection of the body. (See Diet. Nat. Biography,) He 



296 NOTES 

PAGE 

neither avowed nor disavowed the Letters on the Church by 
an Episcopalian, written in his admirable style. 
Dr. Edward Hawkins (1789-1882) was a fellow and pro- 
vost of Oriel College for over sixty years. His sermon 
preached on May 31, 1818, on the Use and Importance of 
Un-authoritative Tradition made a most serious impression 
on Newman {Apologia, p. 372). He opposed the Tracta- 
rian Movement, and was appointed to draw up the con- 
demnation of Tract Ninety. 
9 The Reverend John Bird Sumner (1780-1862) was named 
Archbishop of Canterbury by Lord John Russell in 1848. He 
was liked and assisted by the Duke of Wellington, and al- 
though not sympathetic with the demands of Catholics in 
England, — his appointment by Lord John Russell shows 
this, — he voted for the amelioration of many stringent laws. 
He concurred in the judgment of the Privy Council that 
a clergyman of the Church of England need not believe in 
baptismal regeneration. The best known of his theological 
works is Apostolical Preaching, Considered in an Examina- 
tion of St. Paul's Epistles, of which ten editions have been 
printed. 

Joseph Blanco White (1775-1841). Descended from an 
Irish family, settled in Spain and entered the priesthood. 
He became an unbeliever, left Spain for England, and 
entered the Anglican Church. He was a '' Protestant 
champion." At Oxford he became one of the circle of 
Whately, Hurrell Froude, and Newman, who sympathized 
with his musical tastes. The conflict in his mind between 
Catholicity and the Anglican opinion sent him into Uni- 
tarianism. As a literary man he is best known by his son- 
nets. "This gentleman, who had been called Blanco in 
Spain, — which was a translation of his family name 
White, and who afterward wrote an excellent English book 
of entertaining letters on the Peninsula, under the Graeco- 
Spanish appellation of Don Leucadio Doblardo (White 
Doubled), — was author of a sonnet (Night) which Coleridge 
pronounced to be the best in the English language. I know 
not what Mr. Wordsworth said to this judgment. Perhaps 
he wrote fifty sonnets on the spot to dispro^^e it. Indeed 
it was a bold sentence, and probably spoken out of a kindly 
though unconscious spirit of exaggeration. The sonnet, 
nevertheless, is truly beautiful." — Autobiography, Leigh 
Hunt. The sonnet begins: ^'Mysterious night, when the 
first man but knew." 
10 Butler's Analogy. Joseph Butler (1692-1752) in 1725 be- 
came Vicar of Stanhope, and devoted himself to the pre- 
paration of the isimous Analogy published in 1736. Butler's 
expressed liking for the externals of religion, — see A 
Serious Inquiry into the Use and Importance of External 
Religion, — and the erection of a cross over his palace at 



NOTES 297 

PAGE 

Bristol, induced the rumor that he became a Catholic be- 
fore his death. There is nothing to support this rumor. Mr. 
Gladstone in his preface to the Analogy speaks of the works 
of Butler as ^'classics in the philosophic theology of Eng- 
land." By some writers the Analogy is regarded as a help to 
unbelief. 

13 anti-Erastian. Thomas Erastus (1524-1583). A physician 
and Protestant theologian. He denied the right of the 
Church to excommunicate or to inflict penalties. His name 
has been given to the party in the Enghsh Church that 
believes in state supremacy in ecclesiastical matters. 
Hurrell Froude (1803-1836). The elder brother of James 
Anthony Froude, the historian. A clergyman of the Angli- 
can Church. He was threatened with consumption and 
went abroad accompanied by Newman. His contributions 
to the Lyra Apostolica are signed ^' B.'^ He wro1>e three 
of the Tracts for the Times. In his Remains Froude 
says (p. 404), "We are Catholics without Popery, and 
Church of England men without Protestantism. '^ He died 
before Newman's conversion. The Remains seem to show 
that he was on the road to the Catholic Church. 

14 Arianizing. The most startling declarations of Arius were 
that the Son of God was not the same substance as the 
Father, that he had not always existed, and that he was 
not impeccable. 

Bishop^George) Bull (1634-1709). Defensio Fidei Nicaenae, 
ex scriptis quae extant Catholicorum Doctorum, etc. 

15 Reverend Conyers Middleton (1683-1750). Anglican clergy- 
man of Trinity College, Cambridge. Author of A Free In- 
quiry into the Miraculous Powers of the Christian Church. 
Liberalism. Newman fought a skilful and persistent fight 
against Liberalism as being nothing else than the egregious 
doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion and that 
one creed is as good as another. See vol. i, p. 65, Morley's 
Life of Gladstone. In 1875 Newman wrote to Gladstone : 
"It has been a great grief to me to have to write against 
one whose career I have followed from the first with so 
much loyal interest and admiration. I do not think," he 
concluded, ^' that I ever can be sorry for what I have done, 
but I can never cease to be sorry for the necessity of doing 
it." On Newman's death, Gladstone wrote, "He was a 
wonderful man, a holy man, a very refined man, and, to me, 
a most kindly man." The Arians of the Fourth Century , 
their Doctrine, Temper and Conduct, chiefly as Exhibited in 
the Councils of the Church between a.d. 325 and a.d. 381, 
1833. 

Lord Grey (1764-1845). A Whig statesman, believer in 
popular liberty. He supported the CathoKc claims. See Sir 
Frederick Grey's Life. 

16 Blomfield, Charles James (1786-1857), Bishop of London. 



298 NOTES 

PAGE 

His reputation for scholarship rests chiefly on his editions of 
Callimachus and of several of the dramas of ^schylus. 
Non- jurors. Primarily, the four hundred clergymen and 
nine Bishops of the Church of England who refused to 
take the oath of allegiance to William and Mary, upon the 
ground that they were already bound by their oath to 
James II. In consequence of their refusal, the bishops were 
deprived, in 1691, by act of Parliament, of their ecclesi- 
astical sees. 

Evangelicals. The party in the Anglican Church which 
stood for enthusiasm, fervor, and zeal not hindered by con- 
ventionality. The phrase which best expresses *' evangel- 
ical" is the term *' Methodist Episcopalian." Milner and 
Scott were evangelical. 

"Incessu patuit Dea." That she is a goddess is manifested 
by her step. Virgil, Aeneid, I, 405. 

18 Wiseman. Nicholas Patrick Stephen, Cardinal Wiseman 
(1802-1865), Archbishop of Westminster, was borfi in Se- 
ville, Spain. Mr. Charles Kent, in the Diet. Nat. Biography ^ 
says that he was conspicuous for ^' the general justice of 
his mind." 

19 Dr. Thomas Arnold (1795-1842). Head Master of the fa- 
mous public school, Rugby. Was looked on by Anglicans as 
*' liberal and un-sectarian." He stood against the '' Tracta- 
rians" later, and finally became tolerant. 

20 "Exoriare aliquis." Let some one rise up. Virgil, Aeneid, 
IV, 625. 

Southey's Thalaba. Robert Southey (1774-1843). On the 
death of Pye in 1813 Southey was appointed Poet Laureate. 
His most important works are Thalaba the Destroyer and 
The Curse of Kehama. His claim to be numbered among 
the foremost men of English letters rests more perhaps on his 
Life of Nelson than on his poetry. The Thalaba is probably 
the finest of Southey 's poems; the subject-matter is taken 
from wild Arabian legends. 

21 John Keble (1792-1866). AngHcan divine and poet. He 
was a fellow of Oriel College and showed the highest schol- 
arship. He was disgusted with the condition of the English 
Church. His Christian Year has great spirituality, a power 
of picturing and intense simplicity, but needs careful met- 
rical revision. Newman held that Keble was the real au- 
thor of the Oxford Movement. 

22 Clement of Alexandria (150-214). Christian author and 
Head of Catechetical School in Alexandria. 

26 St. Alfonso Liguori (1696-1787). In 1732 he founded the 
order of the Redemptorists. His works embrace almost 
every department of theological learning ; his correspond- 
ence also is voluminous. His Theologia M oralis has been 
reprinted numberless times, as have many of his ascetic 
works. 



NOTES 299 

PAGE 

Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667). One of the greatest names of 
the EngHsh Church. He was sometimes called the modern 
Chrysostom on account of his golden eloquence. His writ- 
ings are very numerous and characterized by an excellent 
style and deep thought. The most famous of these is the 
Liberty of Prophesying^ and the Ductor Dnhitantium, the 
most learned, subtle, and curious of all Taylor's works. 
Milton (1608-1674). See note on p. 123. 
William Paley (1743-1805). See note on p. 38. 
Dr. Johnson (1709-1784). Newman was strangely attached 
to Dr. Johnson, and it may be interesting to those who 
have observed the attraction to note some extracts from 
Bos well's Life of Johnson. These seem to show quite clearly 
the lexicographer's attitude toward certain doctrines of 
the Catholic Church: 

Boswell: '^ Confession ? " 

Johnson: ^' Why, I don't know but that is a good thing. 
The scripture says 'Confess your faults one to another/ 
and the priests confess as well as the laity. Thus it must be * 
considered that their absolution is only upon repentance, 
and often upon penance also. You think your sins maybe 
forgiven without penance, upon repentance alone." . . . 

In the afternoon the gentlewoman talked violently against 
Roman Catholics, and of all the horrors of the Inquisition. 
To the utter astonishment of all the passengers but myself, 
who knew that he could talk on any side of a question, he 
defended the Inquisition, and maintained that ''false doc- 
trine should be checked on its first appearance ; that the 
civil power should unite with the church in punishing 
those who dare to attack the established religion, and that 
such only were punished by the Inquisition." . . . 

^'What do you think, Sir," says Boswell, "of Purgatory 
as believed by the Roman Catholics ? " 

Johnson: '' Why, Sir, it is a very harmless doctrine. They 
are of the opinion that the generality of mankind are neither 
so obstinately wicked as to deserve everlasting punishment, 
nor so good as to merit being admitted into the society of 
the blessed spirits; and therefore think God is graciously 
pleased to admit a middle state where they may be purified 
by certain degrees of suffering. You see. Sir, there is nothing 
unreasonable in this." 

Boswell: ''But then, Sir, their Masses for the dead ?" 

Johnson: "Why, Sir, if it be once established that there 
are souls in Purgatory, it is proper to pray for them, as for 
our brethren of mankind who are yet in this life." 

Boswell: "The idolatry of the Mass ?" 

Johnson: "Sir, there is no idolatry in the Mass. They 
believe God to be there and they adore him." 

Boswell: "The worship of the saints ?" 

Johnson : " They do not worship saints, they invoke them ; 



300 NOTES 

PAGE 

they only ask their prayers. I am talking all this time of 
the doctrines of the Church of Rome." 

Bos well says of another occasion: ''On Friday, April 18 
(being Good Friday), I found him at breakfast, in his usual 
manner upon that day, drinking tea without milk and eating 
across bun to prevent faintness; we went to St. Clement's 
Church as formerly." 

Mr. Charles T. Waters, in the Irish Monthly ^ recently 
quoted this passage: "Our conversation ran very much 
upon religious opinions, chiefly those of Roman Catholics. 
He took the part of the Jesuits and I declared myself a 
Jansenist. He was very angry because I quoted Boileau's 
bon-mot on the Jesuits, that they had lengthened the Creed, 
. but shortened the Decalogue ; but I continued sturdily to 
vindicate my old friends at Port Royal." 

"When we were at Rouen [says Mrs. Piozzi] he took a 
great fancy to the Abbe Roffette, with whom he conversed 
about the destruction of the Order of the Jesuits, and con- 
demned it loudly as a blow to the general power of the 
Church, and likely to be followed with many dangerous 
innovations, which might at length become fatal to re- 
ligion itself, and shake even the foundation of Christianity." 
27 Scavini, Peter. An Italian author of the last century. His 
principal work was a Theologia Moralis in which he fol- 
lowed the teaching of St. Alphonsus. 

Hey, John (1734-1815). Anglican clergyman. He was a 
rationalist. He held that there was little difference between 
the Church of England and the Unitarians. Nevertheless, 
he defended subscribing to the Thirty-nine Articles, the 
foundation of the theology of the Church of England. 
Burnet, Gilbert (1643-1715). Author of Exposition of the 
Thirty-nine Articles. He is best known by his History of the 
Reformation. 
30 Caravita, Niccolb (1647-1717). Professor of Law at Naples. 

He was the most important preceptor of St. Alfonso. 
32 Cardinal Gerdil,HyacintheSigismon(i (1718-1802). Writer 
on philosophical and theological subjects. His w^orks were 
published in twenty quarto volumes in Rome, 1809. 
Natalis Alexander (1639-1724). He entered the Dominican 
order in 1665. He was professor of Theology in the Domini- 
can convent of Paris, and at the request of the statesman 
Colbert he became one of the circle of learned men whose 
conferences determined the method of education of Col- 
bert's son, afterwards the famous bishop of Rouen. He 
contemplated a work which would embrace the entire 
history of the Church, and completed thirty volumes, but 
on account of the Gallicanism of the author Pope Inno- 
cent XI issued an order forbidding any one to read them. 
In addition to his second great work Theologia Dogmatica 
et Moralis in five books, Alexander wrote a large number 



NOTES 301 

PAGE 

of smaller dissertations and engaged in many controver- 
sies with the Jesuits on questions regarding the conduct 
of the missionaries in China. 
36 The Birmingham Oratory. The old Oratory will soon be a 
thing of the past. In 1905 the foundation of a new Oratory 
was laid. The plan is based on that of San Martino di 
Monte at Rome. A recent writer, evidently well-informed, 
says: ''This has been chosen as a model, because the Car- 
dinal had always intended that such a church should be 
erected at Edgbaston, and with this object in view, caused 
an exact ground plan and elevation of San Martino to be 
made for him as far back as 1850. Hoping, moreover, 
to have been able to begin the building of the church at 
once, Viollet-le-Duc even executed plans for it, and these 
are still in possession of the fathers of the Oratory. But in 
consequence of the generosity of the public in defraying 
the expenses of the Achilli trial, funds to carry out the 
work were not asked for, and so what was then a temporary 
church has had with alterations and additions to do duty 
for the last fifty years.'^ 

Ambrose St. John (1816-1875). Entered the Catholic 
Church in 1845. Author of The True Infallibility of the Pope, 

REVEALED RELIGION 

38 William Paley (1743-1805). AngHcan archdeacon of Car- 
lisle, author of the Evidences of Christianity and the 
Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy. Paley was 
utilitarian in his views and leaned towards Unitarianism. 
His definition of virtue was "to do good to mankind in 
obedience to the will of God, and for the sake of everlast- 
ing happiness." 

39 Sir Archibald Alison (1792-1867). The author of the His- 
tory of Europe, in ten volumes. The work was begun in June, 
1842. Alison was most friendly to the South during the 
American Civil War, and a devoted Protestant. His history 
is a direct and commonplace summary of European events. 
Sir Henry Spelman (1562-1641). He was knighted by 
James I. Most of his life was devoted to antiquarian research, 
the result of which was the Glossarium Archaeologicum, A 
Treatise concerning Tithes, and The History of Sacrilege. 

46 Book of Deuteronomy. Cf. xxxi, 16. 

THE GROUND OF THE PROTESTANT VIEW 

55 Alfred the Great (849-901). King of England and a ruler 

whose energy and wisdom have made him respected by all 

generations of Englishmen. 
58 Jean Froissart (1337-1410). A French historian and poet; 

author of the famous Chronique de France, d' Angleterre, 

d'Ecosse, et d'Espagne. 



302 NOTES 

PAGE 

Sully, Maximilien de Bethune.Duc de (1560-1641). Author 
of Memoires des sages et royales J^conomies de Henri le Grand, 
Doddington, George Bubb (1691-1762). 
Walpole, Horace (1717-1797), whose Letters have made 
him famous in the literary world. 
Hume, David (1711-1776). See note on p. 3. 
Sharon Turner (1768-1847). An English historian of some 
repute, and author of A History of the Anglo-Saxons. 
Macaulay, Thomas Babington (1800-1859). Author of 
the History of England. 
!^ 59 St. Januarius. Bishop of Benevento, beheaded for the Faith 
near Puteoli in the persecution of Diocletian. His relics 
after a time were removed to Naples together with some 
of his blood which had been caught from his wounds. In 
the cathedral at Naples where his head and the blood are 
preserved, the celebrated standing miracle of the liquefac- 
tion is performed, and it has amazed persons of integrity of 
all creeds. When the congealed and dried-up blood in the 
phials is brought near the head it is usually seen to become 
Hquid and to bubble. 

WHO'S TO BLAME 

63 *• Britannia, rule the waves," etc. From Thomson's Ode 
in the masque of Alfred. 

64 Philip and Demosthenes. One by one Phihp subjugated the 
Greek states, while Demosthenes pleaded with the Atheni- 
ans to join their neighbors in war against him. Olynthus 
was the starting-point and Athens the aim of Philip. 

65 Pericles (fifth century B.C.). The most accomplished states- 
man of ancient Greece. To Pericles, a most liberal patron 
of all fine arts, Athens owed the Parthenon, Propylaea, 
Odeum, and many other masterpieces of architecture. 

66 Socrates (469-399 B.C.). A celebrated Greek philosopher 
whose system of imparting information by means of the 
direct interrogation is called the Socratic method. 
Xenophon (c. 430-351 B.C.). The retreat after Cunaxa, of 
which he gives a thrilling account in the Anabasis. Cyrus 
is the prince referred to here. 

Miltiades {d. c. 489 B.C.). The renowned general of the 
Athenians who commanded at Marathon. Later, being 
placed in command against the Persians, he made an attack 
on the island of Paros to satisfy a private enmity. 
Themistocles (d. c. 460 B.C.). On the night before the battle 
of Salamis he sent a faithful slave to Xerxes, the com- 
mander of the Persians, saying that, unless he attacked the 
next day, the Greek fleet would retire and the chance of a 
battle be lost. 

Hannibal (247-185 B.C.). The famous son of Hamilcar 
Barca ; his greatest military failure was his refusal to 



NOTES 303 

PAGE 

march into Rome when he had captured almost all Italy. 
Pylos. An ancient town in Messenia at which the Athenians 
under Demosthenes, the elder, defeated the Spartans in 
425 B.C. 

69 " Optat ephippia bos." Horace, Ep. 1, 14, 43. The slow ox 
longs for the horse's harness. 

71 Scott's "Two Drovers." The character alluded to here if 
Harry Wakefield. 

77 " Deus ex machina." Some man of the moment. 

80 Earl of Aberdeen. George Hamilton Gordon (1784-1860). 
The English statesman who predicted Catholic emancipa- 
tion. 

Gladstone, William Ewart (1809-1898). 
Sidney Herbert, Lord Herbert of Lea (1810-1861). Of whom 
Lord Tennyson says, ^' He was just the man to rule England." 
Newcastle, Henry Pelham-Clinton. Fifth Duke of New- 
castle (1811-1864). 

Raglan, Lord, Fitzroy James Henry Somerset (1788-1855). 
Field-Marshal, w^ho lost an arm at Waterloo. 
Burgoyne, Sir John Fox, Bart. (1782-1871). An eminent 
engineer officer who distinguished himself during the 
Crimean War. 

Dimdas, The Right Honorable Henry (1742-1811). Distin- 
guished in the Indian mutiny. 

' DIVIDED ALLEGIANCE 

82 Mr. Gladstone's Pamphlet. Reference here is made to Vat- 
icanism : An Answer to Reproofs and Replies, by the Right 
Honorable William Ewart Gladstone, M. P., author of The 
Vatican Decrees in their Bearing on Civil Allegiance. (Amer- 
ican Edition, 1875.) See John Morley's Life of Gladstone. 

88 Busenbaum's Medulla. Herman Busenbaum (1600-1668) 
was a Jesuit theologian and famous as a teacher of philo- 
sophy at Cologne. His best work is the Medulla Theologiae 
M oralis. This book, because it seemed to make extrava- 
gant claims for ecclesiastical over civil authority, was burned 
in Paris and Toulouse by order of the Parliaments. 

92 Fr. Perrone (1794-1876). He is regarded as one of the 
greatest Jesuit theologians of his time. Among his best 
works are Praelectiones Theologicae and De Immaculato 
B. V. Mariae Conceptu. 

93 Honore Toumely (1658-1729). A doctor of the Sorbonne. 

Author of Cursus Theologicus dogmaticus et moralis. 
100 Cardinal Turrecremata (Titular, Church of St. Sixtus). 
John Torquemada (1388-1468). An illustrious Spanish 
theologian and the opponent of Wyclif and John Huss. 
He has often been confounded mth that Torquemada, well 
known in connection with the Inquisition, of whom he was 
a relative. 



304 NOTES 

PAGE 

Cardinal Bellarmine (1542-1621). A learned and famous 
Jesuit. He was greatly admired in his time by men of all 
religious opinions. He was a mighty defender of the prerog- 
ative of the Holy See and his works are an arsenal against 
unbelievers.^ The authorship of the hymn '' Pater superni 
luminis" is imputed to him. 

Archbishop Kenrick, of Baltimore (1797-1863). Author of 
Letters of Omicron to Omega, and Theologia Dogmatica and 
Theologia M oralis. 
102 William Chillingworth (1602-1644). A famous theologian 
of the Church of England. Author of The Religion of Pro- 
testantSf a Safe Way to Salvation. 

LITERATURE 

106 " Facit indignatio versus." Indignation makes verses. Cf. 
Juvenal, Sat. I, 79. 

•• Poeta nascitur, non fit." Poets are born, not made. 
Vision of Mirza. Eastern allegorical story by Joseph Ad- 
dison, which appeared in the Spectator in 1711. 

107 Ku8et yato)]/ : Homer, Iliad, I, 405, 906. Exulting in his re- 
nown. 

•* Can'st thou not minister to a mind diseased," etc. Mac- 
beth, Act V, Sc. 2. 

••'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother," etc. Hamlet, 
Act I, Sc. 2. 

108 "OS magna sonaturum." Horace, Sat. I, 4,44. A mouth to 
utter great things. 

" mens magna in corpore magno." Great mind in a great 
body. An adaptation of ''mens sana in corpore sano." 

109 Livy. Titus Livius, the most illustrious Roman historian, 
was born at Patavium, in 59 B.C. He wrote a history of Rome 
in one hundred and forty-two books of which only thirty- 
five have come down to us. He died in 17 a. d. 

Tacitus, Caius Cornelius. An eminent Roman historian. 
The dates of his birth and death are unknown, although it 
is certain he was born about 60 a.d. and survived the Em- 
peror Trajan, who died in 117 a.d. 

Terentius, Publius, the comic poet, was born at Carthage, 
185 B.C., and died in Greece, 159 B.C. 

Seneca, M. Annaeus. Father of the philosopher and him- 
self a rhetorician. Born in Spain. The time of his death 
is uncertain, but he probably lived until the close of the 
reign of Tiberius. His extant works are Controversarium 
and Suasoriarum Liber, neither of which is complete. 
Plinius, C. Secundus. Frequently called Pliny the Elder 
(23 A.D.- 79 a.d). He wrote a great deal during his hfe, 
but of all his works only his Historia Naturalis, published 
about 77, has come down to us. A vast variety of subjects 
is comprehended in this work, — geography, astronomy, 



NOTES 305 

PAGE 

mineralogy, meteorology, botany, all things in fact which 
are natural products find a place in Pliny's history. Its 
scientific merit is not great. 

Quintilian. M. Fabius Quintilianus (35 a.d. - 95 a.d.) 
began his career as an advocate, in which capacity he gained 
an enviable reputation. He was more distinguished as a 
teacher, and his instructions were eagerly sought after among 
all his contemporaries. The reputation of Quintilian in 
modern times is based on his Institutio OratoHa, sl com- 
plete system of rhetoric. The work is remarkable for its 
sound critical judgments, its purity of taste, and its intimacy 
with oratory. 

Isocrates (436-338 B.C.). A celebrated Grecian orator. A 
weak voice and a poor presence made a political career 
impossible to him, but he was a master of rhetoric and 
wrote orations for others for which he received large sums. 
About twenty of his orations are extant. 
Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784). The founder of English 
lexicography and one of the most original and famous 
men of English literature. His style was very sonorous, 
inflated, and apparently studied, and often his written lan- 
guage much surpasses the thought. In 1744 Johnson pub- 
lished his Life of William Savage ; in 1749, his best poem, 
The Vanity of Human Wishes; and in 1750 commenced 
the Rambler, a periodical in which the bulk of the compo- 
sition was his own. Among his other works the Dictionary 
and Rasselas are prominent. Boswell's Life of Johnson 
has probably done as much to render his name imperish- 
able as have the works of the Doctor himself. 
110 Michael Angelo (1475-1564). He stands almost unrivalled 
in Christian art as a painter, sculptor, and architect. Among 
his greatest works are a kneeling angel at the grave of 
St. Dominic at Bologna, the statues of Bacchus and David 
at Florence, the Pieta in St. Peter's, and his great painting 
of The Last Judgment for the Sistine Chapel. He painted 
with his own hand the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. He 
would accept no remuneration for his work, which he re- 
garded as service to the glory of God. 

Raffaelle, or Raphael (1483-1520). Called by his country- 
men Divino. He is placed by almost universal opinion at the 
head of painters. Among his best works are the Coronation 
of the Virgin in the Vatican, Sposahzio at Milan, the St. 
Catharine in the National Gallery, London, the Entombment 
in Rome, and the Transfiguration. Like Michael Angelo he 
devoted much of his life to the frescoes in the Vatican. 
Apollo Belvedere. A celebrated statue of antiquity, which 
is generally considered as embodying the highest ideal of 
manly beauty; the date and artist are mere matters of con- 
jecture. 
Plato (429-347 B.C.). With Aristotle he represents the 



306 NOTES 

PAGE 

bulk of Grecian philosophical speculation. Many of his 
teachings, even in our own day, command the greatest 
respect of dialecticians. He is the head of the renowned 
school of philosophy called the Academicians. 
Virgil (70-19 B.C.). Born near Mantua, and shares with 
Homer the honor of being the greatest epic poet of anti- 
quity. The Aeneid, upon which his fame rests, has been 
translated hundreds of times into almost every language. 
The best Enghsh translations are those of William Morris 
and John Dry den. 

" The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling," etc. Midsummer^ 
Night's Dream, Act V, Sc. 1. 
Ill Demosthenes (385-322 B.C.). The greatest orator of Greece, 
and indeed of the ancient world. A native of Athens. 
The personal character of Demosthenes is beyond reproach. 
He stands as a symbol of all that is just and honest in 
ancient politics. The most important of his speeches are 
his De Corona and his diatribes against Philip of Mace- 
don. 

Thucydides (471-401 b.c). The great historian of the Pelo- 
ponnesian War. The impartiality and fidelity of Thucydides 
in recording historical events, the masterly brevity of his 
style, and his unrivalled descriptive powxr, have won him 
a high place in literature. 
. Herodotus (484-424 b.c). The oldest Greek historian; 
for that reason called the Father of History. His book 
records the struggles between the Greeks and the Per- 
sians. The best version in English is that of Rawlinson. 
Joseph Addison (1672-1719). Born in Wiltshire, England. 
He is typically English in style and is patriotically known 
in England as **our Addison." In 1709, with Richard 
Steele, he began the Tatler, a periodical of literature and 
politics. In 1711 he and Steele first published the Spectator ^ 
a periodical in which appeared much of Addison's best 
work, especially the De Coverley Papers. Chief among 
Addison's writings are The Campaign, the tragedy of Cato, 
1713, A Letter to Lord Halifax^ 1699, and The Usefulness of 
Ancient Medals. 

Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). The historian of the Decline 
and Fall of the Roman Empire. His style is remarkable for 
its condensation and power. 

113 Beethoven, Ludwig von (1770-1827). Born in Bonn, Ger- 
many, and considered by many students to be the world's 
greatest composer. His works include nine symphonies, 
ten overtures, chamber-music, piano-forte music, sonatas 
for various instruments, arias including ''Ah perfido," 
music to Goethe's Egmont, and innumerable songs. 

114 Shakespeare (1564-1616). The master of the poetic drama, 
and the chief literary glory of England 

Pindar (522-442 b.c). The great lyric poet of Greece, born 



NOTES 307 

PAGE 

near Thebes. Of the immense number of his works, consist- 
ing of hymns to the gods, poems, dithyrambs, convivial 
songs, and dirges, only fragments remain. Probably the 
best English edition is that of B. L. Gildersleeve. 
St. Jerome. Born in the middle of the fourth century, of 
Christian parentage. In 379 he was ordained priest at 
Antioch. It was at his permanent retreat at Bethlehem 
that he completed the great literary labors of his life. 
From here he sent forth his denunciation of the heresies 
of Jovinian, Vigilantius, and the Pelagians. St. Jerome is 
universally regarded as the most learned and eloquent of 
the Latin Fathers. 

Dante Alighieri^ (1265-1321). One of the greatest poets 
of all time and incomparably the greatest among the Ital- 
ians. A Florentine. Besides his immortal work, the Divina 
Commedia, his De Monarchia (1310) and Vita Nuova (1300) 
are most important. 

Cervantes (1547-1616). One of the most imaginative 
writers of Spain. Besides his Don Quixote, the best of his 
writings, he is the author of Filene, and Galatea, pastoral 
romances; the tragedy Numancia, Novelas Exemplar es 
(Exemplary Tales), and a novel, The Sorrows of Persiles 
and Sigismunda. 

Fra Angelico (1387-1455). Fra Giovanni Da Fiesole was 
one of the most eminent regenerators of Italian art and 
was also known by the title of " II beato Angelico." He was 
a Dominican. His most famous pictures are the Birth of 
John the Baptist, at Florence, and the Coronation of the 
Virgin, in the Louvre. 

Francia (1450-1518). Francesco Francia, a famous painter, 
remembered chiefly for his Madonnas and his intimate 
friendship with Raphael. He was the founder of a school, 
and was regarded as second only to Raphael in the bril- 
liancy of his genius. 
116 Sophocles (495-406 B.C.). The great master of Greek trag- 
edy, born at Colonus. His private character was easy and 
contented, but not, as has been hastily asserted, profligate. 
He is given credit for the authorship of one hundred and 
thirty plays, seventeen of which have been deemed spu- 
rious. The best known of his works are Antigone, Philocte- 
tes, (Edipus Coloneus, Ajax. Sophocles is justly accounted 
the most perfect technician of the Greek tragedians. 
Euripides (480-406 B.C.). The youngest of the great trio 
of Greek tragedians. Only eighteen of his ninety -two plays 
have come down. The best of these are Alcestis, Medea, 
Hippolytus, Hecuba, Ion, Andromache, and Iphigenia in 
Tauris. 

118 copia verborum. Fluency. 

119 nil molitur inepte. Horace, Ars Poetica, 140. He does 
nothing idly. 



308 NOTES 

PAGE 

apte. To the point. 

Quo fit, ut omnis, etc. Horace, Sat. II, 1, 33. As the life of 

each one lies open as if written on a votive tablet. 

ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERATURE IN RELATION 
TO CLASSIC LITERATURE 

123 John Milton (1608-1674). Universally considered one of 

the great world poets ; author of Paradise Lost, Paradise 

Regained, and Samson Agonistes. 

Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). See note on p. 111. 

124 Father Jean Hardouin (1646-1729). Entered the Society 
of Jesus in 1665, and in 1683 was appointed librarian in 
the College of Louis le Grand. He was extremely sceptical 
as to the authorship of the Greek and Roman classics and 
was much too free in the expression of his extravagant 
opinions. 

Pliny (61 a.d. — ?). Author of Letters. 

Cicero (106-43 B.C.). 

VirgiPs Georgics. Poems treating of agriculture, 36 B.C. 

Horace (65-27 B.C.). 

125 Plato (429-347 B.C.). See note on p. 110. 

Aristotle (384-322 B.C.). The father of scholasticism who 
with Plato represents the bulk of speculation of the Greeks. 
The writings of Aristotle may be said to embrace the whole 
circle of knowledge of his time. 
Burns, Robert (1759-1796). The Scotch Ivric poet. 
Bunyan, John (1628-1688). Author of The Pilgrim's Pro- 
gress, and The Holy War. 

De Foe, Daniel (1661-1731). Author of Robinson Crusoe, 
Moll Flanders, Journal of the Plague Year. 
Johnson, Dr. Samuel (1709-1784). See notes on pp. 26 and 
109. 

Goldsmith, Oliver (1728-1774). Author of The Traveller, 
She Stoops to Conquer, Vicar of Wakefield, and The De- 
serted Village. Goldsmith was the most natural genius of his 
time. The standard Life of Goldsmith is by Forster (1854). 
Cowper, William (1731-1800). A great poet and "inno- 
vator" in English literature; he destroyed the sentimental- 
ists. His fame rests chiefly on The Task and The Diverting 
History of John Gilpin. 

Law, William (1686-1761). See note on p. 6. 
Fielding, Henry (1707-1754). One of the first great Enghsh 
novelists. Authovof Joseph Andrews, Tom Jones, and Amelia. 
Scott, Sir Walter (1771-1832). The best of his poems is The 
Lady of the Lake. Ivanhoe is the best known of his novels. 
Byron, Lord George Gordon (1788-1824). Childe Harold is 
the most popular of the poems of this eloquent poet. 

126 Hooker, Richard (1554-1600). Author of Ecclesiastical PoU 
ity, and one of the most celebrated of English theologians. 



NOTES 309 

PAGE 

His writings are calm and judicious in the highest sense 
of the word. 

Clarendon, Edward Hyde, Earl of (1608-1674), Author 
of the History of the Rebellion. 

Hobbes, Thomas (1588-1679). Author of the Leviathan. 
127 Alexander Pope (1688-1744). ''The English Horace.'' 
Famous as a satirist and moralizer in verse. His Rape 
of the Lock, Dunciad, and the Essay on Man are his best 
efforts. 

Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745). One of England's greatest 
satirists. Author of Gulliver's Travels, the Tale of a Tub, 
etc. 

Hume, David (1711-1776). See note on p. 3. 
Euclid (c. 300 B.C.). Author of the Elements of Geometry, 
and sometimes called the ''Father of Mathematics." 

129 Voltaire, Francois Marie Arouet (1694-1778). One of the 
most notorious of that band of writers whose crusade 
against estabhshed opinions prepared the way for the 
French Revolution. 

Rousseau, Jean Jacques (1712-1778). Author of Bis- 

cours sur VOrigine et les Fondements de VInegalite parmi 

les Hommes, and Les Confessions. 

Pascal, Blaise (1623-1662). One of the most distinguished 

philosophers and scholars of the seventeenth century and 

author of the famous Lettres Provinciates. 

Descartes, Rene (1596-1650). Author of Discours de la 

Methode, 1637, Meditationes de Prima Philosophia, 1641, 

Principia Philosophiae, 1644. 

Rabelais, Francois (1495-1553). French humorist; clever 

but very coarse. The inventor of Gargantua and Panta- 

gruel. 

130 recent critic. Hallam. 

La Fontaine, Jean de (1621-1695). Author of Contes et 
Nouvelles en Vers, 1665, Fables Choisies mises en Vers, 1668. 
Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de (1533-1592) . A distinguished 
French pliilosopher and essayist. 

Ariosto (1474-1533). One of the greatest of the Italian 
poets and author of Orlando Furioso, a beautiful poem in 
forty-six cantos. 

Pulci, Luigi (1432-1487). An Italian poet. Author of II 
M organic Maggiore. 

Boccaccio, Giovanni (1313-1375). The celebrated author 
of the Decameron, and a Genealogy of the Gods, a comprehen- 
sive mythological work. 

Bellarmine, Robert (1542-1621). See note on p. 100. 
Petrarch, Francesco (1304-1374). The greatest Italian 
sonnet writer. 

a Pope. Probably Celestine V, who was elected Pope in 
1294 at the age of eighty and resigned five months later 
in favor of Boniface VIll. 



310 NOTES 

PAGE 

** Poscia ch' io v' ebbi alcun riconosciuto, 
Vidi e conobbi F ombra di colui 
Che fece per vilta lo gran rifiuto/' 

" After I had recognized some amongst them, I saw and 
knew the shadow of him who from cowardice had made the 
great refusal." 

De Monarchia. A prose work written in Latin, since re- 
moved from the Index. 
131 Macchiavel,Niccolo (1469-1527). Author of /Z Priwape and 
numerous historical writings. 

Giannone, Pietro (1676-1748). Author of the Storia Civile 
del Regno di Napoli, and a diatribe against the papacy, II 
Triragno. 

KNOWLEDGE AND RELIGIOUS DUTY 

134 Lord Shaftesbury (1671-1713). Author of Characteristics, 
*' The boldest of English philosophers.'' Voltaire. 

136 Edmund Burke (1730-1797). Author of Vindication of 
Natural Society, Thoughts on a Regicide, etc. 

137 "Whiles rank corruption " etc. Hamlet, Act III, Sc. 4. 

St. Francis de Sales (1566-1622). A saint most attractive 
to the modern mind. His maxims are strong and gentle. 
^* A judicious silence," he says, ''is better than a word spoken 
without charity." He was canonized in 1665 by Alex- 
ander VII. 

147 Cardinal Pole (1500-1558). Author of important treatises 
on the unity of the Church and the Reformation. A most in- 
teresting and consistent character of the Henry VIII period. 
Basil the Great (331-379). One of the most eminent and 
eloquent of the Greek Fathers, whose influence was greatly 
felt in the promotion of monasticism, and to whom is 
ascribed the introduction of the three universal monastic 
vows of obedience, chastity, and poverty. 

Julian (331-363), surnamed " the Apostate," on account of 
his renunciation of Christianity when he ascended the throne 
of Cons tan tine. 

MENTAL SUFFERINGS OF OUR LORD IN HIS 

PASSION 

148 And certain times of the year. Passion Sunday is the 
Sunday preceding the Sunday before Easter (Palm Sun- 
day). The most solemn part of Lent begins. The images 
in the churches are covered with violet, — the symbol of 
mourning; the shadow of the cross deepens, and the re- 
ligious usage of the Church *' requires that all shall tend 
ceremonially to reverence for the Passion." The week 
before Palm Sunday is ''Passion Tide." The week after 
Palm Sunday is Holy Week. 



NOTES 311 

PAGE 

149 As the solemn days proceed, etc. As the sorrow of Lent 
grows darker, each stage in our Lord's passage to Calvary 
is marked in the Hturgy of the Church. One sees this sug- 
gested by the pictures, which no village church is too poor 
to be without, called the ^'Stations of the Cross." The 
sorrowful mysteries of the rosary for these commemora- 
tions are five, beginning with the Agony in the Garden, 
followed by the Scourging at the Pillar, the Crowning with 
Thorns, the Carrying of the Cross, and the Crucifixion. 

150 I say, it was not the body that suffered, but the soul in the 
body. This sermon, which is wonderfully exact and artistic 
in structure, is an analysis of sin and pain so acute that 
it impresses even those who '' efface sin," or do not care 
to define it, as an important psychological contribution to 
literature. For all Christians it has the deepest and most 
lasting memory; but merely as a work of art, of imagina- 
tive insight, of intense feeling, and keen examination of the 
workings of the soul, it is unique. As to the structure in 
which the logic and the art are concealed, it has not been 
surpassed by Newman himself. 

PURITY AND LOVE 

167 The two St. Johns. St. John the Evangelist and St. John 
the Baptist, precursor of Our Lord. 

without sin he was bom. " For he shall be great before the 
Lord, and shall drink no wine nor strong drink; and he 
shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's 
womb." St. Luke, i, 15. 
St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1091-1153). 
Jeremias. He was, during his whole life, which was Httle 
else than a continual martyrdom, "great before the Lord" 
according to the signification of his name. Sanctified from 
birth to be a prophet of God, his lamentations exhibit great 
tenderness and elegiac beauty of sentiment. 

170 St. Antony (251-356). Called the founder of asceticism, and 
one of the especially venerated saints in the calendar. 
St» Cecilia. A Roman martyr. The details of her fife and 
the date of her death are uncertain. Since the Middle Ages 
she has been honored as the patroness of music. 
St. Nicholas of Bari. Born in Lycia. The relics of St. Nicho- 
las were taken to Bari from the East toward the close of the 
eleventh century. 

St. Peter Celestine (c. 1221-1296). Pope. Was canonized by 
Clement V in 1313. He abdicated his authority as Pope in 
1294. Benedict Cajetan was elected in his place. His was, 
indeed, ''a great renunciation." Dante puts this Pope in 
his Hell for it; and Petrarch accused him of cowardice. He 
retired to the Monastery of the Holy Ghost. 
St. Rose of Viterbo {d. 1261). She Hved, according to the 



812 " NOTES 

PAGE 

rules of the Third Order of St. Francis, in her father^s house 

at Viterbo. She had a special gift for the conversion of 

sinners. 

St. Catharine of Siena (1347-1380). An Italian saint on 

whose body the wounds of Christ were impressed. 

THE RELIGION OF THE* PHARISEE, THE RELIGION 

OF MANKIND 

189 Solon (c. 638-559 B.C.). The most famous of all the ancient 
Greek law-givers. 

ABELARD 

200 Peter Abelard (1079-1142). A scholastic philosopher and 
theologian and one of the clearest and boldest thinkers of 
the twelfth century His life was marred by an unfortu- 
nate infatuation for Heloise which threatened for a time to 
check his afterwards useful career. Abelard's character may 
be summed up in a few words. He was one of the most 
brilliant and variously gifted men of all times, a sincere 
lover of truth and champion of freedom. His works consist 
of (1) Sic et Non, a collection of statements of the Fathers 
concerning the chief dogmas of religion, (2) Dialectic, 
(3) On Genera and Species^ (4) Glosses to Porphyry's In- 
troduction, (5) Introduction to Theology, (6) Christian Theo- 
logy, (7) Commentary on the Epistles to the Romans, (8) Ab- 
stract of Christian Theology, (9) Ethics or Know Thyself, 

(10) Dialogue between a Philosopher^ a Jew, and a Christian y 

(11) On the Intellect, (12) On the Hexaemeron. Abelard 
should be considered the real founder of the University 
of Paris. 

Tertullian. Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus. Born 
in Carthage about 150. About 193, certainly before 197, 
he became a Christian, and was afterwards ordained to the 
priesthood. About 202 he became a Montanist and after- 
wards attacked the Catholic Church with the same bitter- 
ness with which he had formerly assailed heathenism. 
The time of his death is not known. The founder of the 
Montanistic sect to which Tertullian in the latter part 
of his life belonged was Montanus, a Phrygian, who be- 
came a Christian some time after the middle of the second 
century. Shortly after his conversion he believed that he 
had become a channel for divine revelation, and in con- 
junction with Priscilla and Maximilla, two ecstatics, he 
began to issue a series of prophecies. The movement was 
founded on the belief that the end of the world was near, 
and that the proximity of the last judgment required that 
the kingdom of God should be established on earth. The 
work of Christ was unfinished, and prophecy was as neces- 



NOTES 313 

PAGE 

sary in the new as in the old dispensation. Montanus and 
his followers declared that they did not wish to change in 
any way the doctrines of the Church, but to interpret them 
more fully. 

The manner in which this kingdom of God which they 
preached was to be established was: (1) By the prohibition 
of second marriages, which they taught were sinful. (2) By 
the establishment of longer and stricter fasts, and the use 
of only the more simple kinds of food. (3) By prohibiting 
Christians from seeking safety by flight in time of persecu- 
tion, and by enjoining the necessity of martyrdom. (4) By 
refusing to admit heretics, murderers, and fornicators to 
penance. (5) By prohibiting personal adornments and the 
practice of profane arts. (6) By compelling all Christian 
virgins, even those not consecrated, to wear veils. (7) By 
the observance of such conduct on the part of Christians 
as the second coming of Christ, which was at hand, would 
demand. 

Montanism was not originally a doctrinal movement. It 
was a reaction in Christianity itself against the customs 
and practices imported into the Church by the converts 
from paganism. It was purely moral or ethical in character, 
and was intended to purify Christian life and morality. 
Sabellius. A celebrated African heresiarch of the third 
century ; was bom probably at Ptolemais in the Pentapohs, 
where, at all events, his opinions were first promulgated. 
Nothing is known regarding his life — the first statements 
current on the subject being of a contradictory and un- 
trustworthy character. It is generally known that he did not 
broach his heresy till shortly before his death, the date 
of which is also unknown. The doctrine of the SabeUians 
had two different forms, both of which denied the distinc- 
tion of persons in God. The earlier form of this heresy dates 
from the first quarter of the third century. The testimony 
of Christians who accepted the Catholic doctrine of the 
Trinity against Sabellius may be traced to the middle of 
the third century. The second form of Sabellianism left 
no room for the Holy Ghost and, in effect, denied the 
Incarnation. In Bishop Whately's Logic there are touches 
of it. Newman in Notes on St. Athanasius lightly dwells 
on Sabellianism. 

The Gnostics. Gnosticism, taken in its broadest sense, means 
that heresy which came into existence almost contempora- 
neously with Christianity, and which was mainly derived 
from an effort to amalgamate false pagan views with the 
truths of the Gospels. It was an attempt to establish an 
esoteric Christianity (gnosis) in opposition to the exoteric 
belief (faith) of the masses. 

St. Irenaeus. Born about 140 a.d. in Asia Minor, where he 
was a disciple of Polycarp. Later he became Bishop of Lyons. 



314 NOTES 

PAGE 

He was a prolific writer. With the exception of a few frag- 
ments all his works are lost except two, Adversus Haereses 
(Against Heresies) and the newly recovered work On the 
Apostolic Teaching. The date of his death is not known. A 
late and uncertain tradition says he was martyred during 
the persecution of Septimius Severus. 
St. Athanasius (296-373). Primate of Egypt. 
St. Augustine Aurelius (354-430). Well called the greatest 
of the Latin Fathers ; he owed his conversion to his mother, 
St. Monica. His Confessions is known everywhere, and 
regarded as a classic. 

201 Apollinaris. About 375 the errors of Apollinaris excited 
great anxiety in the Church. Apollinaris was the son of 
a grammarian of Alexandria, respected, trusted, and ad- 
mired. He was born in Laodicea, and in his youth he 
was befriended by St. Athanasius. He denied the human 
soul in Christ, claiming that its place was supplied by the 
Logos: Teachers in the great school of Antioch combated 
this theory and the doctrine was condemned by several 
synods, especially by the Council of Constantinople (381). 
St. Cyril. One of the most important opponents of Nesto- 
rius at the Council of Ephesus. Theodoric of Antioch opposed 
Apollinaris so intemperately that his disciple, Nestorius, 
went so far as to shock the Catholic world by saying that 
''not God, but the temple in which was God, was born of 
the Virgin Mary.^^ 

202 St. Anselm . . . Bee. The schools of Tours, Rheims, Angers, 
Laon, those of the Benedictines of Cluny under Odo, and 
that of the Benedictines of Bee in Normandy were famous. 
Bee under Lanfranc (1005-1089) and St. Anselm (1033- 
1109) is the school alluded to in the text. 
Charlemagne. Charles the Great, King of the Franks (742- 
814). 

203 Francis Bacon (1561-1626). Sometimes called the in- 
ventor of the inductive method of reasoning, the reformer 
of logic, and the law-giver of the world of thought. He 
was none of these. Flis grasp of the inductive method was 
defective, his logic clumsy and impractical, his plan for 
registering all phenomena and selecting and generalizing 
from them, making the discovery of truth almost a mechan- 
ical process, was worthless. In short, it is not as a philo- 
sopher or as a man of science that Bacon has carved a name 
for himself, but as a man of letters. In this field Bacon is 
almost alone as a writer of English prose, which was by far 
the weightiest, the most lucid, effective, and pleasing of 
his day. Among his most popular books are the Advance- 
ment of Learning, the greatest of his English writings, 
The Novum Organum, and his History of King Henry VIL 
Aristotle (384-322). See note on p. 125. 

William of Champeaux. Died in 1121; was one of the 



NOTES 315 

PAGE 

most ardent champions of realism. He was a teacher and 
friend of Abelard, who took a sane and intermediate posi- 
tion between the ReaHsm of Champeaux and the Nominal- 
ism of Roscellinus. 

204 Seven Arts. The trivium, consisting of grammar, rhetoric, 
logic ; the quadrivium, of arithmetic, music, geometry, and 
astronomy. 

205 John of Salisbury (1120-1180). He attended the lectures 
of Abelard in France and remained there for several years 
studying scholastic logic, grammar, the classics, and 
theology. In 1176 he was appointed Bishop of Chartres. 
His greatest writings are : Policraticus sive de Nugis 
Curalium et Vestigiis Philosophorum, Lihri Octo^ a work 
of great erudition and caustic satire on the follies of cour- 
tiers, and Metalogicus, a defence of the studies of the 
schools against the studies of the ignorant. 

Peter of Blois. A justly celebrated writer of the twelfth 
century, who first studied letters and philosophy at Paris 
and Tours, then went to Bologna, about 1160, to follow 
up lectures on law, and afterwards returned to Paris to 
take up theological studies. He died about 1198 in Eng- 
land, where he had become an important person. 

206 Anselm. Not to be confounded with the saint of that 
name who was the most learned theologian of his time. 
Anselm of Laon was born about the middle of the eleventh 
century and had the advantage of the tutorship of his 
famous predecessor. In 1114 Abelard went to attack 
this old man on his own ground at Laon and in the midst 
of his scholars. Anselm at this time held the sceptre of 
theology, and the courage of Abelard needs no better 
illustration. 

207 Fulco of Neuilly. A famous pulpit orator of the twelfth 
century, the foremost preacher of the fourth crusade. 
Peter of Poitiers. Lived about the middle of the eleventh 
century and was famous as a preacher. Was educated in 
Paris. 

Peter Lombard. One of the most famous of the schoolmen. 
He is often styled " magister sententiarum," as he arranged 
a collection of sentences from St. Augustine and other 
Fathers on points of Christian doctrine, with objections 
and replies also collected from authors of repute. 
Arnold of Brescia. A bitter antagonist of the Church, 
who sought to destroy that body in the early part of the 
twelfth century. He was excommunicated and afterward 
executed at the coronation of Frederick I. 
Ivo, Saint (c. 1040-1116). He was imprisoned for resisting, 
as Bishop of Chartres, the repudiation of Queen Bertha by 
King Philip I, and his marriage to Bertrada. His school 
at the Abbey of Saint Quentin was famous throughout 
Europe. 



316 NOTES 

PAGE 

Geoffrey of Auxerre. Born at Auxerre in the twelfth cen- 
tury. It is stated that he died about the year 1215. He 
was secretary to Saint Bernard of Clairvaux. He was 
greatly respected by Henry II of England. He wrote 
against Abelard, and was, therefore, held to be ungrateful. 

208 Desire of wine, etc. From Milton's Samson Agonistes. The 
speech from the beginning to "Allure thee from the cool 
crystalline stream" is by the Chorus. Newman adds to it 
Samson's speech beginning, "But what availed this 
temperance not complete." 

210 " Heu, vitam perdidi, operose nihil agendo." " Alas, I have 
lost life, laboriously doing nothing." 

THE PEOPLES OF THE PLAINS 

212 Miserere. Psalm 50, which in Latin begins with this word. 
The allusion is to the custom of reckoning time by the reci- 
tation of psalms. 

St. Ignatius in his Exercises. The book here referred to is 
the Exercitia Spiritualia, written by St. Ignatius Loyola, 
founder of the Society of Jesus. 

Turcomans and the Usbeks. Nomadic and predatory Tartar 
people in Central Asia. 

218 Czar Peter. Peter the First and generally denominated Peter 
the Great of Russia. Under his rule Russia first began to 
take her place among nations (1672-1725). 

MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO 

221 Catilinarians. Speeches delivered against Lucius Sergius 
Catilina which are remarkable for their irony and vitu- 
peration. The first and finest of these orations was de- 
livered by Cicero in the Roman Senate in 63 B.C. It was 
occasioned by the attempted assassination of the orator by 
Catiline and a party of conspirators, who sought Cicero's 
death as the first step toward a revolutionary upheaval 
in Rome. The attack on Cicero's house was repulsed, as 
the plot had been revealed to him by Fulvia, mfe of one 
of the conspirators ; and when a day or two afterward 
Catiline appeared in the Senate, Cicero attacked him in 
a speech known as the first Catilinarian, which begins 
''Quousque tandem abutere, Catilina, patientia nostra." 
Catiline attempted a reply, but his words were drowned 
in a storm of hisses, and he was compelled to leave Rome 
on the same night, denounced as a patricide and traitor. 
Philippics. A number of speeches delivered at different 
times and directed against Mark Anthony in particular. 
The name Philippic is given to them because of their near 
approach to the celebrated orations of Demosthenes. 
Piso. The speech against Caius Calpurnius Piso was de- 



NOTES 817 

PAGE 

livered in the year 55 B.C. It is considered the most savage 
of all his orations. Piso, having been recalled from his 
government of Macedonia mainly through the instrumen- 
tality of Cicero, complained to the Senate of his treatment 
by the orator. This gave Cicero the opportunity of pouring 
on the head of the ex-consul the vials of his wrath. He 
calls Piso beast, butcher, gallows-bird, etc., and it has 
seemed strange to some writers that his undignified lan- 
guage was tolerated in the Senate. 

Manilian Law. Cicero made this speech in 66 B.C., the year 
of his praetorship. While it purports to be of the delibera- 
tive order of oratory it is in fact rather demonstrative, con- 
sisting largely of a panegyric on the valor of Pompey. The 
object of the proposed law was to place Pompey in com- 
mand against Mithridates in the third Mithridatic war. 
Marcellus. M. Claudius Marcellus was defended by Cicero 
in the Senate for the great part he had played in the 
civil war as a member of Pompey 's party. Cicero begged 
leniency for him from Caesar, and also took this oppor- 
tunity to eulogize the conqueror. The speech was delivered 
in 46 B.C. 
222 Ligarius. Like Marcellus, Ligarius had sided with Pompey 
in the civil war. He had been pardoned by Caesar but not 
permitted to return to Italy. Cicero's eloquence, however, 
effected a removal of the ban. The Pro Ligario was deliv- 
ered in 46 B.C. 

Archias. The Pro ArcMa was delivered in 62 b.c, in defence 
of the rights of his friend Archias as a Roman citizen. 
Archias had been accused of usurping the right of citizen- 
ship without legal authority. The charge had but little 
foundation, and although the fact is not definitely recorded 
it is morally certain that Cicero won his case. 
ninth Philippic. Delivered 43 B.C. It was made in sup- 
port of a motion by the consul Pansa to give Sulpicius a 
public funeral and to erect a pedestrian statue before the 
rostra. 

Caelius. This speech was most probably delivered in b.c. 56. 
It was a defence of Caelius. on the charge of murder; he 
was acquitted. 

Muraena. Delivered in 63 b.c. A defence of Lucius Mu^ 
raena, consul-elect, against charges of corruption and 
bribery. 

Caecilius. Delivered against Caecilius Niger, a creature of 
Verres, who attempted to become the prosecutor of Verres 
in accordance with the practice common in Rome called 
praevaricatio, that is, collusion with an adversary at a trial. 
Cicero, who wished to drag Verres to justice, had first to 
refute the right of Caecilius to act for the prosecution. He 
then delivered his famous In Caecilium and triumphantly 
vindicated his claim, b.c. 73. 



318 NOTES 

PAGE 

Hortensius. One of the most able lawyers at the Roman 
Bar, and one who was more nearly a rival of Cicero than 
any of the Roman orators. 

223 Cluentius. Cicero defended him from a charge of murder 
in the year B.C. 66. 

Pro Milone. Speech in defence of his friend and supporter 
Milo, who was on trial for the murder of Clodius, 52 B.C. 
The speech was but poorly delivered owing to the disturb»- 
ances in the Senate caused by the supporters of Clodius 
and was probably entirely re- writ ten by Cicero. Milo was 
condemned. 

Verres. Caius Verres was impeached by the Sicilians on 
the charge of extortion in 70 B.C. Cicero conducted the 
prosecution and made the case so clear that Verres fled 
without a defence. 

Agrarian law. Brought forward by the tribune Servilius 
Rullus. The object was to create ten commissioners with 
the power to dispose absolutely of the public lands of the 
state and out of the proceeds to purchase other lands in 
Italy. Although this law was a popular one, Cicero by the 
most skilful oratory succeeded in convincing the people 
that it was against their interests. The bill was rejected. 
Rabirius. The Senator Rabirius was defended by Cicero 
on the charge of murder of Saturnius. In a former trial, 
when defended by Hortensius, he was convicted, but Cicero, 
in a trial before the people, succeeded in having the charges 
withdrawn. 

Cato. In his speech against Muraena, charging him with 
bribing citizens to follow him about in the street singing 
his praises, and in this way influencing his election, Cicero 
first denies that citizens were bribed, then advises Cato 
that it is the only chance the poor have of showing their 
gratitude. 

224 Aulus Gabinius, tribune B.C. 67-66. 

225 Sextius, Publius. Defended by Cicero in B.C. 56 on a charge 
of rioting brought forward by Clodius 

Gavius. A Roman citizen living at Syracuse, who, on in- 
curring the wrath of Verres , was thrown into a miserable 
dungeon called Latoniae. From this place he contrived to 
escape, but was captured by the soldiers of Verres and 
crucified. Gavius sought to save himself by the oft-repeated 
cry, ''Civis Romanus sum," but in vain. Cicero made use 
of this incident in his speech against Verres. 
Sylla. He defended Sylla against the claims of persons 
whose property he had confiscated, and succeeded by his 
eloquence in persuading them to abandon it. 
S. Valerius Flaccus. Successfully defended in charges of 
extortion in 60 B.C. 

Plancus, Miinatius. After a wonderful effort by Cicero, 
acquitted of illegal practices in obtaining an election. 



NOTES 319 

PAGE 

Vestal Fonteia. Sister of Fonteius whom Cicero defended 
in a criminal case in 76 B.C. 

226 Marcus, Junius Brutus. Born 85 B.C. Spent his early life 
in devotion to literary pursuits. He sided with Pompey 
during the civil war, but after the defeat at Pharsalia 
made his submission to Caesar and was appointed Governor 
of Cisalpine Gaul. The influence of Cassius prevailed on 
him to join in the conspiracy which ended in the death of 
Caesar. Brutus was forced by the eloquence of Mark Anthony 
to leave Rome shortly after this crime. Defeated by An- 
thony and Octavianus at PhiUppi (42 b.c), he ended his life 
by falling on his sword. 

Calvus, Caius Licinius (82-46 B.C.). Newman, who admires 

the exuberance of Cicero, censures Calvus and the *'new 

school " of orators who tried to imitate the Greek austerity 

of language. 

Sallust, Caius Crispus. A Roman historian. Born at 

Amiternum, 86 B.C. His chief work is the Bellum Catili" 

narium, sl description of the Catiline conspiracy. He is 

also the author of the Jugurtha commemorating the 

five years' war between the Romans and the King of 

Numidia. 

Terence. See note on p. 109. Six comedies are extant 

bearing his name, which are probably all he produced, 

Andria, Hecyra, Eunuchus, Phormio, Adelphi, and HeautoU" 

timoroumenos. 

227 Livy. See note on p. 109. 

Tacitus, Caius Cornelius. See note on p. 109. His extant 
works are Vita Agricolae, Historian Annales^ commencing 
with the death of Augustus and ending with the death of 
Nero, De Moribus et Populis Germaniae, and Dialogus De 
Oratoribus, a work which cannot be attributed with certainty 
to Tacitus. 

Brutus, Lucius Junius. Figures in the legendary of Rome as 
the hero who overturned the monarchical and established 
the republican form of government. Little more can be 
said on historical evidence with regard to Brutus than that 
there existed a person of that name who held high office in 
Rome. 
229 Carneades. A Greek philosopher born in Africa about 
213 B.C. He was conspicuous for his eloquence, and was 
sent to Rome 155 B.C. with Diogenes and Critolaus. In 
Rome he delivered two orations on justice, in the first of 
which he eulogized virtue and on the following day in a 
second speech proved that it did not exist. 
Cato, Marcus Porcius. Surnamed the " Censor '^ and " Cato 
Major.'' Born at Tusculum in 234 b.c. He early dis- 
tinguished himself as a pleader at the Roman Bar and 
was elected consul. He exhibited extraordinary military 
genius in Spain and was sent to Carthage as a legate. On 



320 NOTES 

PAGE 

his return to Rome he uttered the famous words " Carthago 
delenda est," Carthage must be destroyed. He denounced 
Greek hterature and the language as injurious to national 
morals. His one literary work which has survived the ages 
is De Re Rustica (a treatise on agriculture) , which appears 
much corrupted. 

Laelius, Caius, surnamed "Sapiens" (186-115 B.C.). In 
early life he made a special study of philosophy under the 
tutorship of Diogenes, and afterwards studied law, taking 
a high rank among the orators of his time. Cicero placed his 
name at the head of an essay on friendship. 
Carbo, Caius. A very great Roman orator. Cicero said 
that he had grace and elegance rather than brilliancy. He 
was murdered in 32 b. c. 

Gracchi. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus. Born about 
168 B.C., and educated with great care by his excellent 
mother, Cornelia, daughter of Scipio Africanus. He was 
present at the capture of Carthage, and is said to have been 
the first Roman to scale the walls. Gracchus espoused the 
cause of the people, and was elected to many political offices 
through their fondness for him. He was killed in an elec- 
tion feud. Caius Sempronius Gracchus was nine years the 
junior of his brother, and was possessed of much greater nat- 
ural powers. At his brother's death he was serving in Spain 
under Africanus. He returned to Rome, goaded by his 
brother's shade, and was elected tribune in 123 B.C. He 
too was killed in a street fight after some years of most 
valuable service to the cause of the people. 
Antonius (83 B.C.-30 B.C.). Mark Anthony. 
Crassus, Lucius Licinius (6. 140 B.C.). The best orator of 
his age, he was distinguished for his honesty and for his 
subtle wit, both of which quahties made him greatly be- 
loved by the Romans. He died in 91 B.C. in consequence 
of the excitement attending a heated debate in the Senate. 
Gotta, Gains Aurelius (6. 124 b. c). He was of the more 
severe school of Crassus, Greek rather than Roman. An- 
other Cotta (Lucius Aurelius) flourished when Cicero was 
young. Cicero acknowledged his debt to the eloquence of 
this Cotta and to Hortensius. 

Sulpicius, Rufus (6. 124 b. c). Cicero says that he was the 
most dignified orator of his time. He was naturally of the 
forum and not of the stage. It is said that he could not 
write. He lives in the testimony of Cicero. That he was 
bribed by the popular party is a stain on his memory. The 
exact date of his murder is doubtful. 

Hortensius, Quintus. He was born in 114 b. c, which made 
him eight years older than Cicero, who rivalled and ad- 
mired him. In his nineteenth year his oratory excited 
enthusiasm. His energy in making a gesture caused the 
rupture of a blood vessel, and he died in 50 B.C. 



NOTES 321 

PAGE 

Callidius, Marcus {d. c. 43 b.c). He was a logical and lucid 
orator, but he was not successful in exciting the feelings 
of his auditors. He is regarded by modern students as 
exact and subtle. Cicero admired his clearness. 
231 Giardini. Felice Di Giardini (1716-1796). Born at Turin 
and celebrated as a composer and as a master of the violin. 
Among his most famous compositions are the operas Love 
in a Village, Rosmina, Cleonice, and the oratorio Ruth. 
Beside this he wrote many sonatas, arias, chamber-music 
and songs. 

Rossini, Gioachino (1792-1868). One of the greatest com- 
posers of the nineteenth century for the Itahan Lyrical 
Stage. His most famous compositions are the operas 
Tancredi, Guillaume Tell, Semir amide, Otello, and his Stdbat 
Mater. 

Corvinus Messala, Marcus Valerius (b.c. 59-a. d. 3). A 
scholar and an orator, as well as a statesman. His poems 
are very frivolous, — in direct contrast to his prose. He 
was a keen strategist in war. To him Cassius complained, 
before the battle of Pharsalia, that Rome would live or fall 
by a single stroke. His eloquence was persuasive, melodi- 
ous, and artificial. 

Cassius Severus, or Cassius Parmensis. Must not be con- 
founded with Caius Cassius Longinus, the arch-conspirator 
against Caesar. Severus was also one of the assassins. He 
adhered to Pompey and supported Anthony until the defeat 
at Actium. He fled to Athens, but was arrested and exe- 
cuted by order of Augustus. He made some pretensions to 
poetry. 

Maecenas, Caius Cilnius. A Roman statesman celebrated 
for his patronage of the fine arts. Born in the early part 
of the century before Christ. His great friendliness with 
Augustus helped to place in Caesar's hands the reins of 
government and Maecenas in turn was made administrator 
for all Italy. 

Gallic. Pro-consul of Achaia in the time of St. Paul, 53 a.d. 
He was one of the last victims of the tyrant Nero. 

ST. PHILIP AND SAVONAROLA 

231 St. Philip Neri (1515-1595). Renowned as the founder of 
the Congregation of the Oratory. His character even in 
boyhood foreshadowed the career of piety and benevolence 
to which he was destined. Although he did not receive 
holy orders until 1551, he had already been for some years 
one of the most zealous workers among the poor and sick 
in Rome. In his early life, as well as in later years, he 
exhibited a marked influence on persons of vicious char- 
acter and seems to have been highly respected among 
these as in every other circle of society. In union with 



322 NOTES 

PAGE 

his friends, Tarugi and Baronius (author of the gigantic 
Church History), in 1575 he founded the Congregation of 
the Oratory. I'he aim of this society, besides the personal 
sanctity of its members, was the care and instruction of 
the poor and uneducated, the moral uplifting of those in 
need of it, and the withdrawing of youths from danger- 
ous amusements by the substitution of sacred musical 
entertainments, operas, and dramas called ** oratorios." 
The personal character of St. Philip, the unselfish devo- 
tion of his life, his unaffected piety, his genuine love for 
the poor, and a certain quaint humor have made him one 
of the most loved of saints. He died at the age of eighty, 
in May, 1595. A comprehensive work on St. Philip is 
Father Faber's translation of Father Bacci's St. Philip 
Neri. 
232 his biographer. Father Bacci, Life of St. Philip Neri, pub- 
lished at Rome in 1622. 

Jerome Savonarola (1452-1498). In 1474 he entered the 
Dominican Order after an excellent home education both 
in the philosophy of the schools and the old Greek philo- 
sophy. His first appearance as a preacher, in which voca- 
tion he afterwards became eminent, was a signal failure; 
but later, when taking as his subject the sinfulness and 
apostasies of the times, his success was immediate and 
widespread. His life was one of religious and political re- 
form in which he antagonized at some time or another 
nearly everybody connected with the Church and State. 
His one mission in life seemed to be the repression of vice, 
the prohibition of an immoral tendency which seemed to 
be widespread in Italy, and the fight against the Pagan 
Renaissance. On account of his exaggerated interpreta- 
tions of the Apocalypse he was summoned to Rome to 
answer a charge of heresy, but whether the sentence of 
excommunication was ever passed upon him is a mooted 
question. In 1498, he with two others of his order, having 
been found guilty of heresy, misleading the people, and 
seditious practices, were executed by the secular power. 
An interesting discussion of Savonarola and his so-called 
excommunication is contained in Was Savonarola really 
Excommunicated 9 by J. L. O'Neill, O. P. 

234 small community. The germ of his larger community and 
founded for the same purpose. 

235 St. Augustine. First Archbishop of Canterbury. In 596 he 
was sent by Gregory the Great to England to convert that 
country to Christianity. 

St. Patrick (396-469). Apostle of Ireland. In 431 he was 
sent by Pope Celestine to Ireland. He is said to have 
founded three hundred and sixty -five churches and to 
have baptized twelve hundred persons with his own 
hand. 



NOTES 823 

PAGE 

St. Boniface. The Apostle of Germany (680-755). Bom in 
England. Sent to the Teutonic tribes by Pope Gregory II. 
St. Francis Xavier (1506-1552). His conversions in Portu- 
gal, China, and Japan have made him especially venerated 
in these countries. 

238 Pope Alexander the Sixth. This refers to Savonarola's con- 
viction that he was right in his teaching, since, while Alex- 
ander was attempting to silence him, '' it was not against 
the Pope that he stood forth, but he contended that he was 
following what would have been the Pope's instructions 
had he not been deceived.'' 

239 Thomas a Kempis (1379-1471). See note on p. 6. 
Tauler, John (1290-1361). A celebrated Dominican 
preacher, born at Strasburg, who is considered the most 
eloquent German of the Middle Ages. 

243 Sebastian, St. A martyr who is said to have been shot to 
death with arrows in the persecution of Diocletian. 
Laurence, St. Archdeacon of Rome during the Pontificate 
of Sixtus II, martyred during the persecution of Valerian 
in 258. 

244 Callista. The book takes its name from a beautiful Greek 
girl, Callista, who possesses all the graces of the old pagan 
civilization. She sings, dances, and is, besides, a sculptor 
of unusual ability. Agellius, a Christian, falls in love with 
her. It is the hope of Jucundus, uncle of Agellius, that she 
will be able to bring Agellius back to the pagan ideals 
existing in the luxurious life, customs, and ceremonies then 
prevailing in Proconsular Africa. Callista desires to know 
more of the religion of the austere Christians. Agellius falls 
ill and is nursed by Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, who is in 
hiding. While there a plague of locusts devastates the land 
and the people rise up against the Christians. Callista goes 
to warn Agellius of his danger. He has left to meet his 
uncle, but in his hut Callista meets Cyprian, who gives her 
the Gospel of St. Luke. Through this she embraces Chris- 
tianity. Later she is put to death by torture, refusing to 
abjure her faith. Her body is rescued by Agellius and given 
Christian burial, and she is canonized. Agellius becomes a 
bishop and is also martyred. 

267 Loss and Gain. It is not essentially a novel of action. As 
Newman himself says, it is simply a description of the 
course of thought and state of mind, or rather one of those 
courses and states, which issue in conviction of its di\dne 
origin. The central figure of the novel is Charles Reding, 
the only son of an Anglican clergyman. At Oxford he falls 
in with a number of students who are seriously interested 
in the religious tendencies of the day. Although Newman 
has disowned any intention of reproducing real characters, 
the book is curiously like his own experiences at Oxford, 
and the group which Reding joins very similar to the 



324 not:es 

PAGE 

coterie of which Newman himself was a member. At the 
outset Reding, in a comparatively untroubled state of mind, 
comes upon an old Catholic chapel which has just been 
restored. This arouses his curiosity. Gradually he is led 
into a state of perplexity, and by a process of argument 
with the many men he meets, and through experience, he 
finally arrives at that point at which he is convinced of the 
divine origin of the Roman Catholic Church and formally 
adopts that faith. 

MY LADY NATURE AND HER DAUGHTERS 

279 While her holy thoughts still roam. Newman writes : 
Vide 1 Pet. iii, 5, and cf. Gen. xxiv, 22, 23, 28 (Douay 
Version: 1609). 

*' For after this manner heretofore the holy women also, 
who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in sub- 
jection to their husbands." 1 Pet. iii, 5. 

" And after the camels had drunk, the man took golden 
earrings, weighing two sides: and as many bracelets ten 
sides weight. Gen. xxiv, 22. 

"And he said to her: Whose daughter art thou? Tell 
me: is there anyplace in thy father's house to lodge? Gen. 
xxiv, 23. 

** Then the maid ran and told in her mother's house all 
that she had heard." Gen. xxiv, 28. 

285 VALENTINE TO A LITTLE GIRL 

If the lyrical quality in verse is the singing quality, 
Newman — like Tennyson — had it in perfection. How 
this little poem sings! The line 

" Valentine is every one " 

has been often, in the printer's phrase, "queried." The 
poet explains it in the context. First, there is the implied 
reference to the noble meaning of the name itself, and its 
place among the army of chivalrous martyrs, — such as 
St. Denys, St. George, St. Martin, St. Maurice, and Theo- 
dore, — all of the family of the highest lineage through 
their valiant devotion '' in the quarrel of the Lord." 

287 WAITING FOR THE MORNING 

A prelude to the Dream of Gerontius, as Tennyson's Lady 
of Shalott is a prelude, or lighter experimental overture, 
to the idyll of Elaine. The quotation from Bede may be 
rendered, '* Like a meadow in which souls suffer nothing, 
but wait, yet unfit for the Beatific Vision." 



NOTES 325 

PAGE 

HORA NOVISSIMA 

The Last Hour, — see Dream of GerontiuSy — '* Novissima 
horaest: and I fain would sleep." 

288 LUCIS CREATOR OPTIME 

From the Roman Breviary. 

*'Lucis Creator optime, 
Lucem dierum proferens, 
Primordiis lucis novae 
Mundi parans originem." 

289 THE PILLAR OF THE CLOUD 

Lead, Kindly Light was named, in Verses for Various Occa- 
sions, The Pillar of the Cloud. In the Apologia, Newman 
writes: ''I was aching to get home; yet for want of a ves- 
sel, I was kept at Palermo for three weeks. I began to 
visit the churches, and they calmed my impatience, though 
I did not attend any services. ... At last I got off on an 
orange boat, bound for Marseilles. Then it was that I 
wrote the lines, Lead, Kindly Light, which have since be- 
come well known." 

Sometimes a fourth stanza is printed with Lead, Kindly 
Light, but it was not written by Newman. 

During this period of exile in the orange boat, Newman 
wrote several poems, as he says in the Apologia. They 
are easily recognized by the dates. The date of Lead, 
Kindly Light is, as will be noticed, '* At Sea, June 16, 1833." 

^'Some persons," he once said, ''have liked my Lead, 
Kindly Light; it is the voice of one in darkness, asking 
help from our Lord. But this Pie had been ill, and Fathers 
Anthony Pollen and Lewis Bellasis had just played and 
sung for him Father Faber's Eternal Years, which he 
loved], but the Eternal Years, is quite different; this is 
one in full Hght, rejoicing in suffering with our Lord. 
This is what those who like Lead, Kindly Light must come 
to — they have to learn it." 

290 TWO LYRICS FROM " THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS " 

In Dr. Barry's Newman, the following passages are very 
admirable parts of an admirable and artistic biography: 
" * I am too old to write; I cannot hold the pen,' he [New- 
man] said, and his tremulous fingers laid it down for- 
ever. 

"■ But for a long time every third thought had been his 
grave. In 1865, on the death of a dear friend, he had cast 
his musings into the form of a dramatic poem, but was 



326 NOTES 

PAGE 

not satisfied with it, and flung the manuscript aside. By 
good hap one saw it that had eyes, rescued its pages from 
the dark, and persuaded him to let others read it. The 
poem thus perilously nigh to destruction proved to be 
The Dream of Gerontius." 

*'The Dream," Dr. Barry further truly says, ''is a rare 
poetic rendering into EngUsh verse of the high ritual 
which, from the death-bed to the Mass of SuppUcation, 
encompasses the faithful soul. It pierces, indeed, beyond 
the veil, but in strict accordance or analogy with what 
every Catholic holds to be there. Hence'' — and here 
Dr. Barry states something of "The Dream" thought by 
many, but not before put into words — "we shall best in- 
terpret its meaning, if we liken it, not to Milton, whose 
supernatural worlds are his peculiar device founded upon 
heathen rather than Christian tradition; nor to Dante, 
who mingles history and landscape from his time and 
travels in the solemn sweet Purgatorio which remains his 
masterpiece; but to Calderon's Autos Sacramentales, at 
once an allegory and an act of faith." 

The song of the Soul, beginning " Take me away, and in the 
lowest deep," is a finer and deeper poem than Lead, Kindly 
Light. Both in this lyric and in the song of the Angel is 
a music, — so delicately modulated, so exquisitely appro- 
priate, — unexcelled in English poetry. The reason that 
these two solemn and beautiful songs have not become so 
popular as Lead, Kindly Light is probably because of their 
more mystical sentiment. Dante, speaking of those who, 
like Virgil, longed, without suffering and without hope, 
says : " We reached a meadow of fresh verdure : giu- 
gnemmo in prato di fresca verdura." The allusion in the 
speech of the Ghost in Hamlet, beginning, 

"I am thy father's spirit, 
Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night," 

is to actual torment in Purgatory; in Dante the noble 
Pagans have no hope of the Beatific Vision; in Waiting 
for the Morning, the "waiting" is the suffering. It seems 
strange that in the churches where English hymns are per- 
mitted at funeral Masses, neither of these lyrics is usually 
sung. Perhaps they await a musical composer like Elgar. 
There are germs of other "nature" poems in many of New- 
man's early letters. He connected the sea with thoughts 
of spring. In a letter to his mother, March 30, 1827, 
he says: "Does the sea blossom? Are green leaves bud- 
ding in its waters, and is the scent of spring in its waves ? 
Do birds begin to sing under its shadow, and to build their 
nests in its branches? Ah, mighty sea! Thou art a tree 
whose spring never yet came, for thou art an ever- 
green." 



NOTES 



327 



PAGE 

292 



HOME 



This is probably the best of Newman's sonnets. He 
made it after a visit to the family of his friend, Frea- 
erick Rogers at Blackheath. In consequence, he wrote 
*' the lines which stand first in the Lyra Apostolica, ' Wher- 
ever I roam/ " 



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